


Don't Stand So Close To Me

by shewasagaystripper



Category: Queen (Band)
Genre: 1960s, Blackmail, High School, High School AU, M/M, Non-consent, Teacher AU, This is the real work guys, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-12
Updated: 2018-10-12
Packaged: 2019-07-30 00:20:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 47,248
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16275347
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shewasagaystripper/pseuds/shewasagaystripper
Summary: Sometimes you don't know exactly how wrong something is until you're in too deep to escape





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Alright, guys, I think I miraculously managed to write a three part story and here is part one! This takes place in the late sixties, when Brian was a maths teacher (I think we’re all stuck with that image, isn’t? ;)). Freddie and Roger are seventeen; John is fifteen. I think most of you can deduct from the title (which is a Police song, in case you don’t know it) that is has something to do with student-teacher relationships. This is a more serious and dark subject (see note and warnings) but I thought I might have to try this as well.  
> Notes and warnings: This fic contains student-teacher relationships, non-consensual/underage intercourse, one character downplaying criminal offences, cheating, and (low-key) blackmail. In my country, the age of consent is sixteen, which means that some (but not all) of these relationships would be legal, apart from the fact that relationships between teachers and their students are forbidden by law in any case. Please understand that I do not agree with basically anything that happens in this story, but as a writer, I sometimes let my mind go astray.

It was almost half past three when Brian at last allowed himself to look up from his work to let his glance rest on the three boys in the front row of his eleventh grade maths class, and he dropped the ballpoint pen he had been using before to grade tests with to once again divert his attention towards the three students. It wasn’t the first time it struck the young maths teacher that they made quite an interesting group of friends, really. On the right side of the three desks they had secretly put together when they thought their teacher wasn’t looking, was Farrokh Bulsara – who insisted on being called Freddie – a shy but flamboyant boy who didn’t care the least about maths. He seemed fairly busy at the moment, but Brian could tell by experience that his entire maths notepad was covered with doodles for art class rather than with formulas. 

Next to him was Roger Taylor, leaning back on his chair with a nearly elegant carelessness that almost made Brian want to tell him to get back to work, but he didn’t, because that would betray that he had been looking at them. Again. In any case, Roger was both one of his favourites, but also one of the most nerve-wracking students he had; a playful, cheeky, often utterly annoying but also irresistibly funny and charming blond boy who certainly was blessed with capability for maths, but who cared even less about school as a whole than Freddie did about maths, if that was even possible. 

The only exception to this overall disinterest in this subject of both the group of friends and in the whole of 32 students this class counted, was the boy sitting on the left side of Roger, who listened to the name John Deacon. His intelligence and capability of problem analysis surprised Brian time after time, as well did his reticence and his nearly painful quietness. The only one who really managed to get him out of his comfort zone of ever-lasting silence and obedience was Roger, who was now proving this talent of his by whispering something in John’s ear, making John look up at his friend with eyes wide with surprise, after which he leant over to scribble something in Roger’s notebook. They shared a quick glance and a chuckle, and John went back to work whilst Roger continued joking around with his company on the other side.

Though Brian had no idea where this quick meeting had been about, these were the moments that confirmed his suspicions that whatever was growing between the shyest and the loudest student of this class, was more than just friendship. They adjusted so perfectly to each other – Roger was noisy and outgoing, but calm and nearly protective around John; on the other side, John seemed to completely live up with Roger at his side, as if he almost forgot about his usually shy and withdrawn appearance. Brian was sure Freddie was onto them, too, for he had exchanged his seat with Roger a few days ago so the two of them could sit next to each other. He hoped they weren’t aware of his suspicions, but Brian had seen love flourishing inside the classroom before, and he could definitely tell these two were head over heels for each other, even though they didn’t know so yet themselves. God, if they could only see…

Brian was disrupted from these thoughts however when Roger’s whispering changed into talking, which eventually morphed into a voice in which the entire class could enjoy the subject he was talking about. His attempt to catch the student’s attention by coughing loudly was rather fruitless, so Brian called out his name, which seemed to at least address Roger and the two boys sitting at either side of him.

‘Taylor, could you be quiet, please? People are trying to work here,’ Brian informed him sternly, hoping he wouldn’t notice that half of the people behind him were probably more engaged with folding  squared paper they had torn out of their maths notebooks into paper planes than with their matrices assignments. 

Roger released the pencil he had been chewing on from his mouth to reply – he did seem to be well-mannered enough to do so. Brian recalled him usually talking with his mouth full, so this decent attitude kind of surprised him. He knew he should have known better than think that this correct behaviour was going to last for longer than three seconds, though, when a cheeky smile spread across Roger’s lips his nearly sultry voice laced with provocation and pride.

‘I think you know _exactly_ how to shut me up, mister May,’ Roger replied leisurely before the pencil slipped back between his parted lips and his perfectly white teeth, holding Brian’s intense gaze for a moment that lasted just a second too long to pass for ‘coincidental and meaningless’.

 _This boy is such a goddamned devil,_ Brian thought to himself, cursing himself for just sitting back in his chair and staring into those bright blue eyes without reproving the owner of them for his insolence. All he could do was hope that the class was wooing at him because he had the nerve to talk back to a teacher, and not because they actually understood the meaning behind that shamefully suggestive remark. The knowledge that he would get Roger back for this later that day, gave Brian the relief he needed for the moment and tell him calmly to go back to work before averting his eyes and focus on the maths test in front of him, praying inwardly that his embarrassment didn't show too much by his reddened cheeks. He didn't seem to be the only one who was ashamed by Roger's remark, though - John gave his friend a poke against his upper arm, not daring to face him after he had made a remark more suggestive than he would probably ever be able to come up with, let alone that he would ever utter such words to a teacher.

God, John and Roger were such opposites. Whilst it was a mission impossible to make Roger shut up for more than five seconds, it was even more impossible to get John to talk out loud in class. He barely ever talked, and when Brian would ask him to say something out loud in class every now and then, he would often tell him he didn’t know the answer to a question, even though Brian was positive he knew. He could tell, because it was almost impossible to detect any mistakes in John’s tests and homework assignments. This lack of errors was not exactly convenient right now, because at the moment, Brian was desperately searching for a few mistakes in the test lying in front of him on his desk, to which he turned with a sigh as he withdrew his eyes from John and Roger when he found himself checking them out again. He frowned when he looked at yet another perfect description of the solution of an algebraic problem, wondering how on earth he was ever going to succeed in grading John’s test below an A- if the student continued being this good at maths. 

Brian managed to mark just a few minor mistakes in writing down formulas before the school bell rang and the sound of students standing up from their assigned seats, zippers of pencil cases closing, books being pushed into overstuffed school bags filled the room. Brian looked up from his work, facing his thirty-two pupils, who were looking coyly at him, awaiting a sign of dismissal.

'Any further questions?' Brian asked as he stood up from his chair, smoothing his hands over his blazer. 'Yes, Ezekiel?'

'Do we have any homework or-' he started, only to be punched by his friend standing next to him, mumbling not to give Mister Music, as they called him ever since they had found that he was even more passionate about music than he was about scientific subjects, any ideas.

The class held their breath while Brian seemed to contemplate the idea of giving them a load of assignments for the next day, probably inwardly cursing the person who had brought up the plan. But when Brian stared outside at the clear blue sky, he decided that it was better not to for this time. This was partly because he remembered how he used to detest having to make homework while the rest of the town was able to go outside and enjoy the day of sunlight one could reasonably call 'rare' in their country. But mostly, it was because he wanted to be alone, and having to flick through his notebook to impose a list of assignments on a bunch of unenthusiastic teenagers would not exactly contribute to the plan of having everybody leave the classroom as soon as possible. Everyone apart from a few.

‘No, not today. Your homework is to go outside and enjoy the lovely weather while it’s here, isn’t?’ he winked, and the class sighed in relief, surprised by this sudden kindness and empathy. 'Anything else?'

A boy on the left raised his hand, and without awaiting approval required to speak, he continued to ask: 'Do you have the notes, mister May?'

'No, not yet, Jacob. I'm about half way through.' _I might have been a lot further if I hadn't been desperately trying to find mistakes in John's test, he thought to himself deciding not to add that sentence to the story._ 'But I'll see you on Friday and I promise I will have your notes by then.' The students nodded obediently, and when Brian dismissed them with the words 'have a good afternoon' and the gesture of opening the door, they moved their way through the labyrinth of tables and chairs, towards the door, wishing their teacher a good afternoon while he did the same to them, his greetings interspersed by a few soft-spoken orders that Brian knew the students only listened to because he hadn't given them any homework for the next class.

'Make sure you don’t forget the test next week. David, could you pick up that paper note, thank you very much - and please move the table and chair back to where it belongs, Farrokh.' Brian tried to sound as authoritative as he could to make an impression on him, but the Persian boy just snickered, not even trying to resist dropping an edgy remark before slowly obeying to his order.

‘You know I prefer Freddie, dear,’ the boy said without doing as much as blinking, and Brian sighed. If he hadn't known that John and Roger would make such a great couple, he might have thought that Freddie and Roger would go together very well, for they both were exceptionally provocative and cheeky. Who on earth would go around and say ‘dear’ or ‘darling’ to a teacher they had only known for hardly half a year? Maybe it was in their nature, maybe it was because he, as a 22-year old beginning maths teacher, didn't give them enough resistance. But the thought of doing so next time didn't appeal to him either; he had to admit that he kind of enjoyed the boldness of the seventeen year olds, full of life and energy and most of all mischief. So if that included a few cheeky comments every now and then, he gladly let it pass, knowing they would eventually come around and make up with him for disturbing his classes like that.

And that 'eventually' was now.

'I’ll see you all tomorrow,' Brian said to the departing class as he negotiated his way through the pupils in order to go back to his desk, where he picked up his notebook, letting his eyes travel along the pages as mindlessly as possible. There was one thing he yet had to do, and he had to bring it as nonchalantly as he could. He hoped the nervous gesture of fiddling around with the button of his blazer wouldn't betray his nerves as he managed in a more stable voice than he could have hoped for: 'Oh, before I forget, I would like to have a word with some of you.' He let his index finger slip along the list of names, as if he didn't know their names by heart. Of course he did. 'So, Roger Taylor, I would like to speak to you about your use of language,' he started, only to find the both him and Freddie chuckling when their eyes met his. 'And, let me see... John Deacon.'

The secondly mentioned person seemed way more disturbed for being on the list of people Brian wanted to talk to, and he looked up at him insecurely, his eyes carrying a sparkle of something close to shock. 'Don't worry. It's just about some particularities I found in your test,' Brian tried to calm him down, but this didn't exactly soothe John in any way - it only seemed to worry him even more. He didn't dare to face his docent as he nodded obediently, finding help in Roger, who assured him that it was probably nothing.

Brian waited until the rest of the people had disappeared, leaving him on his own with the two elects, of whom one had taken place on top of his desk, arms folded over his chest, looking at him rather daringly, while the other one - needless to say who this was - was still standing next to his desk, biting insecurely on the nail of his right thumb as he looked at his teacher in a form of anticipation close to fear. It once again stuck Brian how different the two of them were; one overly brave and the other unnecessarily quiet and insecure. Still, he couldn't shake off the thought that this would compensate and strengthen each other's vulnerabilities.

'So,' Roger broke the silence eventually, making Brian realise that he had been pondering about the two of them together for way too long again. 'You wanted to talk to us, mister May?' he asked, voice dripping with false politeness, and Brian coughed as he straightened his tie.

'Yes, I would _very_ much like to talk to you both, but apart from each other. Starting with John,' he said with a short nod towards the younger, who seemed to be feeling unwell with nervousness, even though Brian thought there was no reason to be so. Therefore, he decided that it was better to first relieve John from his nerves, and afterwards have a more serious talk with Roger about the rather insolent remark he had made during this class, and also about the similarly and equally unheard comments he had made many times before. 'So I suggest you go the library and start working on your punishment already.’

‘Punishment?’ Roger repeated as if he had never heard the word before, though Brian was positive he must hear it on a daily base.

‘Yes, exactly. I think I’m going to assign you some lines… Fifty times _'I must not make suggestive remarks to the teacher in class._ ' Brian said with the straightest face he could produce at the moment, but Roger’s reaction to it - snickering while adjusting is stance – didn’t really contribute to that pursuit.

'That's ridiculous.’ Roger rolled his eyes. ‘Just in case you weren’t aware of the omnipresent concept that most of us call ‘ _time_ ,’ I would like to introduce you to it and inform you that we don’t live in the fifteenth century anymore.’

'Roger...' John squeaked, obviously distressed by the risky reply his best friend dare to give to the teacher. ‘Watch your mouth, you’ll only make things worse,’ he hissed quietly.

'That makes a hundred times,' Brian said without even thinking, folding his arms over each other as to copy Roger’s way too self-confident pose.

'What?!' Roger replied rather indignantly, much to Brian’s dismay.

'Would you like a hundred and fifty? No? Then be quiet now. Do you have a pen and paper?'

Roger sighed after briefly having checked the contents of his bag. 'I'm afraid not,' he replied apathetically. John, probably fearing Brian’s disapproving headshake was not going to be the only sign of dissatisfaction he was going to show off to the student, quickly reached out for his bag and grabbing his pencil case and notebook. Carefully tearing out a piece of paper and extracting a pen from his etui, he whispered ‘here you are’ as he handed the items over at Roger, who gave him a thankful wink.

'Thanks for your help, John. Still, another fifty lines for you for not bringing your school supplies.’ Brian informed Roger. He would have much rather given him a spank for his insufferable behaviour – corporal punishment _was_ legal after all, and he had heard several other teachers about their ways of handling Roger when he misbehaved or disturbed their classes. Another time, another place, he might have toyed with the idea of doing the same, but apart from the fact that he was principally against beating students, it didn’t seem like a good idea with someone as anxious and as easily startled as John around. Though Brian wouldn’t mind spinning Roger around and letting him _feel_ what he thought about his conduct, the last thing he wanted was to give the younger student the idea that he was going to physically punish him as well for an offence he hadn’t even committed. Therefore, he now turned to  Roger to say: ‘I want you to write another fifty times, _‘‘I must come to school prepared.’’_ '

'Preparing me is _your_ job, remember?' Roger mumbled under his breath, and Brian decided that it was probably best for all of them to pretend not to have heard that.

'Off you go now, and come back in here in half an hour. I want to be able to see that you’ve actually made progress by then,’ Brian ordered, following Roger with his eyes as the boy threw the strap of his bag over his shoulder and paced out of the classroom, closing the door behind him with what seemed to be a perfect gentleness at first but ended up as quite a loud slam that seemed to catch John by surprise. _What an insufferable troublemaker he is_ , Brian thought to himself, _but_ _I’ll get him back for that._

‘So, that’s that.’ Brian offered John a reassuring smile, but his company didn’t manage to smile back at him. He had sat down on top of his desk by now, legs neatly arranged next to each other, hands in his lap, looking even more shy and hesitant and insecure than usual this way. ‘My oh my, he can be tough, don’t you think?’ Brian chuckled in an attempt to ease the mood. John looked at him hesitantly, as if he wanted to say something to defend his best friend, but decided not to, to avoid any more troubles.

‘Anyway, I think you know why you’re here,’ Brian then started, probably realising that small talk wasn’t what John wanted at the moment – it seemed like he just wanted for him to get to the point. Having to stay after class because a teacher wanted to discuss something was not exactly his hobby, especially not when it was with the maths teacher.

‘My test?’ John guessed. ‘Did I… Did I do well this time?’ He was hardly audible; he sounded like he didn’t dare to ask the question, afraid of the response he would soon be given.

Brian felt like such a fucking _liar_ when he wordlessly replied with a vague hand gesture and a slightly frowning expression on his face as to tell him that he had seen better, because in fact, almost everything about his test had been great. But since he needed for John to get an average great that most students would have been okay with (but which would be disastrously low for his most brilliant student), he could not tell him the truth, and therefore leant with an effortless elegance against his desk and replied: ‘Well, what can I say? It wasn’t what I’m used to see from you. I know you can do much better than this.’

John sighed softly, studying his fingernails – even from multiple feet of distance, Brian could still see that his hands were trembling. ‘What was it?’

‘C+,’ Brian said, false disappointing dripping off his voice. John chewed on his bottom lip as he gloomily gazed out of the window, a silence falling into the abandoned classroom. Brian followed John’s gaze, wondering what he was thinking about – something he found himself doing all the time. From all his students, John was the one he thought was most difficult to fathom. John was distant for about ninety-nine percent of the world, but to the ones he loved and trusted, he seemed to be an open book.

Brian often wished he was one of those people. One of the ‘‘lucky few’’ that had the privilege to really get to know John. Unfortunately, he was well aware that this was most likely to be a right that only a few people possessed; probably just his parents and siblings – if he had any – along with his best friends, which would be Freddie and Roger. _Most_ of all Roger. There was only one thing that Brian was absolutely sure of regarding his shyest pupil, and that was that for John, it was _always_ Roger. It was visible in the way he looked at him like he was the most important person in his life - which he probably was - and in the way he always moved his chair close to Roger's, always trying to be as close as possible to him. It was audible in the way he spoke to him, giggled at his jokes and witty remarks, whispered announcements that were supposed to be secret for the rest of the class into his ear. In everything John said and did, he simply seemed to cling to Roger, who gladly let him do so.

Everything apart from these occasions. That was something solely between John and him.

‘Mister May, could you close the curtains?’ John’s question brought his teacher back to reality. Brian knew that it wasn’t just another trick to distract him; John didn’t like feeling exposed, so he nodded shortly as he strode over to the other side of the room to put his question into practice. He reached out for the curtains of the classroom, but he didn’t turn his back on John, wanting to keep him in vision; John, who seemed to grasp the moment to hastily wipe a few tears from the corners of his eyes. Brian knew the tears were not so much for the grade itself, but for something that followed it.

‘Hey, don’t worry. You know we can do something about it,’ he proposed softly when he walked back to his desk, and though the teacher knew that John had had the solution to the problem he had created himself in mind all the time, he still froze when the words were discretely verbalised. Keeping his head down, John nodded in agreement, sniffing softly.

‘Is that a yes?’ Brian asked, much more because he liked to hear John confirm his question than because he hadn’t heard the answer – no matter how soft-spoken or how barely visible it had been, all he had to do was read John’s body language to deduct that he had given in to his solution.

‘Yes, mister May,’ John clarified, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. Brian looked at the boy for a few seconds before realising the one thing he always forgot – it was never going to be John who was going to start this. He was always going to be the one who had to make the first move, to take the initiative, since John was too shy and too reticent to do so. It wasn’t that the older man minded that John never took the lead; it was just something he deducted after all these times. He knew John was here to serve another purpose than he was, which once again became painfully obvious when John cast his eyes down when Brian moved his hand down to the button of his trousers.

However, John clearly wasn’t ready yet, for he interrupted him with a question. ‘Do you have – eh, you know…’ John made a vague gesture of his hand, eternally avoiding Brian’s eyes as he awaited an answer.

Brian nodded, and then, when he realised John wasn’t looking at him: ‘Yes, of course.’ He knew that John had his limits, too, and on top of that, he seriously didn’t want to hurt him or make him more uncomfortable than necessary either. Therefore, he always made sure he had enough necessities in the lower drawer of his desk, safely locked away in case any curious bystanders decided to go through his drawers in search for a board eraser or some other classroom supply and stumble upon the forbidden items instead.

Brian walked over to the desk and knelt down to slowly insert the key of the drawer into the lock, taking his time by practically letting all the contents of the drawer slip through his fingers, knowing that John needed a moment for himself  to gain the confidence to move on. As expected, John did just that – at first, Brian could feel John’s eyes on him to check if he really wasn’t looking at him. Then, after a shaky sigh, John’s trembling fingers made their way to the waistband of the trousers of his school uniform, unbuttoning,- and unzipping them soundlessly, a light pink blush creeping up his cheeks when he pushed them halfway down his hips, knowing that Brian would take it from there. The teacher fiddled around with the contents of his drawer until he eventually stood up again, placing the two packages down on the desk next to the one John was sitting on. The student was waiting unwillingly for him to take the lead, trying not to glance at the well-known bottle of lube and paper box of condoms that were on the table next to him, ready and close at hand to serve their purposes.

They didn’t remove more clothes than absolutely necessary; John always tried to keep as much pieces of his school uniform on as possible, and Brian, understanding the unspoken preference, obliged by tugging his trousers and boxers only just low enough to free his already uncomfortably hard erection. He ripped open the plastic package of the condom, rolling it down his hard length, and coated both himself as John with a more than sufficient amount of lube. John needed thorough lubrication and preparation before Brian could enter him, both in physical and emotional aspect, and they once agreed to always use condoms. Therefore, Brian softly yet determinedly pushed his victim down by his thin shoulders, until his back reached the table leaf, his underwear low enough for Brian to slowly push his lube-coated fingers inside of him, one by one, until he decided that John was loose enough to move on.

Brian was standing in front of him at the right side of the desk, and John briefly looked up at him, a shaky sigh escaping him when he realised that the moment of no return was upon him. Brian continued to yank John’s underwear further down his legs before  positioning himself against his entrance, feeling him tightening at the touch of the rubber-coated erect flesh that was soon going to intrude his lower regions.

‘It’ll be over soon,’ Brian promised, almost feeling his stomach turn when he said that. Why the hell was he doing this, knowing that all John wanted for it to be over? How could he _live_ with himself, knowing that John wasn’t giving him natural content for this, but only the kind of content enforced by blackmail? Because Brian basically threatened that he wouldn’t pass his class if he didn’t sell his body to him?

Pushing the thought away, like he always did when both the moral consequences of his actions and John’s fearful eyes were probing at him, he leant in to press himself inside of John, whose eyes fell shut when he did so. One of his hands was clawing helplessly at the surface beneath him, which was the smooth wood of student desks that didn’t grant him any kind of support; the other hand served as something to bite down into when the hot, searing pain of having someone inside of you overwhelmed him. Just looking at John, trying so hard to keep taut and not to show through how much pain he was going, made Brian feel like the worst person on earth.

And he knew that he was, in fact, the worst person on earth for doing this.

‘It’s okay,’ Brian hushed, and John looked up with eyes that were filled with tears already. ‘It’ll be over soon. Just try to relax,’ he added, even though he knew pretty damn well that it was impossible to relax when someone you didn’t even _want_ was forcing himself onto you. John nodded briefly in an attempt to cut off his teacher’s fruitless attempts of trying to console him and start the real thing. Brian had grown to understand that John didn’t really appreciate his endeavours to try and calm him down before doing what he aimed to do with him, probably seeing it as a stay of execution. _The sooner we start, the sooner it’ll be all over_ must have been John’s motto regarding this matter, he thought dimly.

Brian nodded in understanding – he wasn’t happy about John’s quietness, because he could never quite figure out what he was thinking every time it happened. Clearly, he didn’t enjoy it. But what more did he think about it? Was he angry at him for luring him into a situation like this? Was he ashamed, or did he repeatedly tell himself that it wasn’t his fault each time Brian let him stay after class to ‘work on his notes’? How badly did it hurt him? Did the thought of Brian forcing himself onto him haunt him in his worst nightmares? Brian had no idea, but he did realise that this wasn’t the best moment to think about it, not now John was lying underneath him, his body trembling breath circulation shallow, eyes draw close, waiting for him to start the torture that they called ‘the deal’.

So Brian did. He pulled out almost completely before pushing back in, probably too rough, for the movement wrung a strangled cry from John. He would soon find that this was going to be one of the few times John was going to make a sound in general – after a few more tensed exclamations, he had gotten as much ‘used’ as possible to the intruder in his nether regions to stay sound- and motionless, which gave Brian the opportunity to let go the last of his walls and enjoy himself instead, as it were.

Apart from John’s reticence and Brian’s guilt complex, the act of sex itself wasn’t even unenjoyable, Brian had to admit with a sting of guilt. After having contained himself all day long around the young school boys, he was eager for someone, preferably calm, quiet and contained John, who just let him do whatever he wanted without any complaints or restrictions, to relieve him from his needs. It was like the most perfect deal: Brian would change John’s C’s into A’s if John offered him his body and his permission to do whatever he wanted to do with it. No, he was saying it wrong. It _would_ have been the most perfect deal, if he hadn’t been lying to John through corrupted his particularly high grades into mediocre ones. The fact that sexual blackmail and teacher-student intercourse was illegal under any circumstance, was something he preferred to leave out for the moment.

Hearing John gasp beneath him was what brought him back to reality, watching him carefully to make sure he was doing alright; as ‘alright’ as he could possibly be at the time speaking. From his body language or his facial expression he couldn’t make up whether it had been because he was hurting him more than usual or if he had pushed himself deep enough inside to hit his prostate, which was always a moment of shock and surprise for John. But upon seeing that the student was struggling, Brian decided to help him out to the limited extent he was capable of.

‘Hold onto my arm,’ he offered, and though he knew that John probably didn’t want this whole thing to be more than business-like without any form of affection, he did gratefully clung onto the arm Brian held out for him, squeezing it painfully hard with every thrust. It hurt pretty badly, Brian had to admit, but he assumed that the things John was going through at the moment now that he was forcing himself onto John’s body, must be even way more painful, so he decided to just bite his bottom lip and let him be, allowing him to literally clamp onto the only one that might be keeping him from breaking down.

_Mechanically, he moved in and out of his victim, who, with his shaky arms clung around his upper arm and his eyes drawn close tightly, a single tear running towards his ear, looked so damn fragile and so dependent that Brian had to look away for a moment, afraid he’s simply shut down and apologise for everything he had done to him if he had to look at him any longer. He was caught up in this horribly dangerous scene that he couldn’t back out of, nor could he bring it to a next, more sentimental  level, knowing that John wanted to keep the emotions out of this. He could do nothing but try to make this as fast and painless for John as possible, which was why he was happy that he could feel his orgasm starting to build up somewhere deep down in his lower belly, hoping for John that it would all soon be over for him once he’d reached his peak._

_Another couple of tensed minutes later – minutes filled with silent curses followed by muffled excuses from Brian’s side as he became slowly more aggressive as the end neared, while John seemed to be having to put more and more effort into his eternal goal of trying to slow as less emotions and tears as possible – Brian finally felt the sweet sensation of orgasm starting to flow through his body as he emptied himself out inside of John in waves that  built up until he couldn’t keep quiet any longer, trying to muffle a scream by gnawing down his own fist. John on the other hand seemed to stay perfectly calm, a sigh of relief escaping him, his still school uniform-clad chest rising and falling in a more regular pace than before now that he had fulfilled his task of letting his teacher do whatever he needed to do in order to reach his climax in peace, not interrupted by his reticence or nervousness._

The intense pleasure that an orgasm brought upon one was strong enough to make the guilt fade away for a moment, allowing Brian to focus on himself and nothing else besides that for a moment. But when he finally came down to earth again (after having flashed John the faintest of a smile and having received the shortest tug at the corners of John’s lips he had ever seen in return), one glance at John’s lower body confirmed that he had once again not enjoyed himself either emotionally, nor sexually at all. Brian felt the blush starting to creep up his cheeks. He knew John had once told him that it was nothing personal, but still, the man felt awkward every time he came down from the heavenly trip that people called orgasm, only to find that John was still completely flaccid. He couldn’t oppress the tendency to try and make up with his personal little plaything. 

‘Do you want me to-’ Brian started, reaching out for John’s still alarmingly limp cock, then dropped his sentence when John shook his head feverishly, as could have been expected. During all these times that John and he had ‘put things right after class,’ John had never gotten particularly turned on, let alone that he had ever climaxed, and Brian’s attempts to make him do so were not really successful or appreciated either. John really didn’t want anything out of this apart from a decent grade, and Brian had accepted that, even though he wished John would let him do more for him – both to ease his own conscience and because John really was special to him. He knew that fucking him after class wasn’t exactly an appropriate way to show him that, but at this point, he didn’t know what else to do than trying to make sure he enjoyed himself, too.

After the last wave had faded away, Brian pulled out of John, taking a step back to grant him more space. John gratefully took advance of this gesture, pushing himself up on his elbows, his facial expression tensing up for a second when he did so. Judging by his painful frown, Brian figured that it must have hurt terribly. Of course, they did preparation all the time, but in the rush that they always were in to get started and finish before any janitor or cleaning lady or overenthusiastic stay-after-school-to-correct-tests-teacher would walk through the door that Brian cursed because he couldn’t be locked from the inside, he never had quite enough time to really thoroughly make sure John was ready.

‘Are you alright?’ Brian asked him while rolling down the condom for which he soon had to find a way to get rid of, since simply tossing it in the litter bin of the classroom clearly wasn’t an option. John nodded hastily but sadly while fixing his trousers with trembling hands.  Brian wrapped the used condom into a plastic bag and tossing it into his briefcase to discard it later on, before following his example and zipping up his pants. John made a second attempt of getting off the desk, which didn’t work due the probably unbearable pain without Brian helping him standing up. John coughed softly while he carefully started to refashion his uniform until there were no crinkles or creases or anything else that might betray their rather unusual business left.

 _‘_ Good,’ Brian picked up the conversation, taking in a gulp of air as he nervously ran his hand through his curls, walking over to his desk to rearrange an already perfectly straight pile of papers. He never really knew what to say when they had finished their session; they usually just exchanged a few words, after which John would hurry homewards to his family that must be wondering why it took him so long to get home. Just the thought of John’s family waiting on somewhere out there in a London suburb, blissfully unaware of the forbidden intercourse between their son and his teacher, made him feel queasy. Brian knew he had to be alone before the guilt would take over – and for another reason even more.

‘That was… Good. Thank you, John,’ Brian nodded shortly at him while John collected his schoolbag, dividing the pile of tests into two for no particular reason besides giving himself something to do while John looked at him in anticipation. ‘I’ll see you in class tomorrow.’

John nodded softly at him. ‘Mister May? The, uhm… What about the test?’

‘The test?’ Brian asked puzzledly, before he realised the deal. ‘Oh, yes, the test! Of course, the test. I’ll take care of that, don’t worry. It- it’s all being taken care of,’ he answered incoherently, biting down his lip in guilt when John’s test, already marked with the well-deserved A, passed his slippery fingers.

The question he had feared to hear, became reality. ‘What did I do wrong this time? Did I confuse linear and exponential formulas? Probability? Logarithms?’ John asked softly, and Brian cursed under his breath. Of course, John tried about _everything_ not to have to let this happen again, not aware that he had actually done a perfect job on the test. He kept asking what he had to do better next time, not knowing that no matter what he did, Brian was going to give him an insufficient grade anyway, keeping John in the eternal oblivion and self-consciousness that he needed him to be in since he wanted this destructive vicious circle to continue.

‘I, eh… I have to admit that I don’t know by heart,’ Brian stuttered as he sank down in his office chair. ‘We’re going to discuss the test with the rest of the class at the end of the week, okay?’

John didn’t seem too satisfied with that answer, but shy and afraid as he was, he just nodded at him. Probably understanding that he wasn’t going to get any information out of him, he took the first steps towards the door. ‘Goodbye, mister May,’ was the last thing he said before opening the door to the outside world that didn’t have a clue of what had just passed between his teacher and him.

‘Goodbye, John,’ Brian responded, trying not to look at his nearly painful looking way of walking that was undoubtedly the result of their session, burying his face in his hands when he was sure the student couldn’t see him anymore. The question that haunted him every time he did this popped up in his mind again. Why was he doing this to John, to _John_ out of all possible people? John, his quietest student, who was so shy that he hardly dared to speak or even face him when he asked him something in class. John, the most organised pupil around, who was the only one Brian was sure of that always made the homework he was assigned to do, brought his school supplies with him, came to school on time. John, the smartest, who had skipped ninth grade, and who therefore also was the youngest of the class. John, the only student who truly seemed to be interested in the subject he taught. John, the only student who had the capability to score straight A’s just by himself, without having to offer his body and soul to Brian to reach those perfect marks. John, who – though actually _nobody_ deserved so – was the very last person to deserve to be sexually manipulated. Why was he doing this to _John_? He had always avoided the specific word for this kind of intercourse, but he knew he couldn’t pretend like it wasn’t true - why was he _raping_ John?

Much time to overthink the ever-lasting guilt tripping questions he did not get, because before he knew it, a knock on the door that was barely a split second ahead of the entry of the student he had sent away. Brian didn’t have to look at the clock attached to the opposite side of the classroom to know that it was impossible that thirty minutes had passed already, but the solution could be found in Roger’s tendency not to listen to anyone and just do whatever he pleased.

'Look who's back!' Roger chanted as he closed the door with a lot more force that necessary, the sound of wood clattering against wood ringing through Brian's ears. The sudden sound surprised him, even though he knew it shouldn't; Roger was always loud and explicitly present. At first, Brian had though that it was just his way to draw the attention in a packed classroom, but after having spent some time with him alone, he soon learned that it wasn't; being this way was something that was in his mind and soul, and the maths teacher had to admit that he didn't mind it, not to say that he kind of loved it, especially because it formed such a contrast with John.

 _John. John, who's only left my classroom about a minute ago. John, who must be going home now all alone, thinking of excuses to tell his parents to explain his tardiness. John, who will probably be trying to keep his expression and mind as blank as possible, trying not to let anyone notice what is really going on. John, who will probably be crying his heart out about these events in the middle of the night, when no one can hear him,_ Brian thought with pain in his heart.

 _Forget it,_ Brian reproved himself. _Focus on Roger first._

Brian decided to drop the whole dilemma with John and he stood up, practically towering over Roger in an attempt to leave an impression on him. 'So, there you are already. It seems highly unlikely to me that you've finished your lines in such a short period of time,' he concluded. The cheeky smile plastered across his face indicated that he had not done his assignment, or at least not according to the rules.

'Here you are,' Roger smirked, handing Brian a notebook that looked so decent that it only made sense to Brian once he remembered that it belonged to John. The letters that filled about half of the first page however was unmistakably Roger's - Brian could recognise his boyish stationary through the hastily-written scrawls that were only just visible through the dark blue ink spots smudging the page. The kind of words he had written down were so typically Roger that Brian had to oppress the tendency to hit his own forehead with his hand while he read them aloud.

 _'I must not make suggestive remarks to Mister May because they might sexually frustrate him and he can't fuck me into next Friday with 30 unexpecting students around.'_ Brian threw the notebook down on the desk and looked sternly at Roger, who, standing in his in his eternal arms-crossed-over-his-chest position, radiated a mixture of self-satisfaction, playfulness, and a perfect realisation of what he was doing. He expected some kind of explanation, but all he got was a shrug that would have been describable as ‘innocent’ another time, another place.

‘What kind of nonsense is this?’ Brian asked him when a response held off.

Roger frowned for a second, probably fumbling for something witty, before his face suddenly brightened – he had probably found what he had been looking for. ‘Oh, do forgive me, I must have forgotten to count in the new student. It should be ‘you can’t fuck me into next Friday with 31 unexpecting students around,’ he recited his own text with one small adjustment with such a coy voice that it made Brian want to stride over to him, press him against a wall and deliver him a spanking that would make him regret acting so innocently. When Brian opened his mouth to say something indignantly, but ended up closing it again, Roger decided to add teasingly: ‘Or wouldn’t you mind some audience? Some watchers to witness you plugging me up the ass in an abandoned classroom with the curtains clos-

‘Roger! Such language!’ Brian interrupted him, almost feeling indignant by his words, but just not yet – he couldn’t help being amused by Roger’s licentiousness in both his use of language and his use of his own body. Just thinking about how his affair with Roger had come to be, made Brian chuckle. It had originally started off as a compromise; Brian had made the offer not to send him to the headmaster’s office if he gave in to a proposal that was similar to what he had proposed to John at the time. But soon, it turned out that it meant something completely different for Roger that what it meant to John. While John wanted to avoid having to make use of the proposal at all costs, Roger soon seemed to be begging for the illegal attention Brian would give him if he misbehaved. He became more troublesome with every passing day, just so Brian had a reason to give him detention, which he would then be able to pay off by letting Brian do whatever he wanted to do. He was so fucking risky, and the worst thing was that Brian _loved_ him for it, even though he knew it was so fucking wrong.

‘For the second time today – I think you know exactly how to shut me up.’

 _Oh, this boy is such a Goddamned devil,_ Brian thought once again _. He’s just begging for it, and you know what? I’ll let him have his way. I’ll show him what I do with boys like these._ 'Okay, that's it. Over the desk, _right_ _now_ ,' Brian ordered as he pointed at the exact same desk John had been lying on. The only difference was that unlike John, Roger gladly obliged, walking towards his assigned place with a smirk on his face as if he had finally achieved a goal he had been fighting for for ages, and without any signs of doubt, he bent himself headfirst over the desk, waiting for Brian to rip off both his own and his clothes.

Waiting for Brian to remove the every piece of clothing that was in the way, was practically the only thing he had in common with John; apart from that, Brian was always more than surprised by how different the two were in bed (or, in their case, over the desk of the classroom). John let him do whatever he wanted while trying very hard not to burst out in tears throughout the whole session, while Roger didn’t seem to have any boundaries and sincerely wanted to be pushed to the limit; John was quiet and never uttered a word, whereas Roger would shamelessly scream and beg for release if you didn’t do anything to restrict the noise he would make to prevent outsiders from walking into the scene. The two were so damn different in terms of intimacy, but Brian could still picture them being together very well. Such outspokenly reticent or loud characters might even have their merits; the question who would be dominant and who submissive, wasn’t something they would ever have to argue about.

‘Well? Are you gonna come over or do I have to do everything myself?’ Roger asked as he glanced over at Brian, who had been contemplating both his relationship with John and Roger ánd the potential relationship between the last two for way too long again, almost forgetting about the present time. Fortunately, just seeing Roger, bent over and eagerly waiting on him, was enough to bring him back to reality. He strode over to Roger and stood still right behind him, rubbing his cock – that not so miraculously had been swelling again due to Roger’s behaviour – against Roger still completely covered ass. Roger hissed in delight at the touch of his bulge, making Brian chuckle.

‘Are you getting hot and bothered already by this? You little _slut_ ,’ he emphasised while pulling Roger’s trousers down in one quick yank, revealing his boyish underwear and trailing a long finger over the curve of his ass, making Roger gasp and push up against the sensation.

‘Always for you, ’Roger declared sultrily while Brian held him down with one hand on his back while pulling his boxers just below the curve of his ass, revelling at the sight of his bare backside that was all his for now. Not wasting any time, Brian ripped aside his own trousers and underwear, instantly guiding his proud erection towards Roger’s entrance, feeling Roger thrusting up against him and begging rather shamelessly for him to fill him up.

After just having had John, his first instinct would be to reach out for the bottle of lube that was still standing on the desk next to the one they were on, before realising that he shouldn’t. With Roger, he never used lube or another form of preparation or even condoms – not because _he_ didn’t want to, but because _Roger_ preferred without. Roger was the typical example of someone ‘who liked it rough’; the harsher the entering and the wilder the thrusts,  the better he enjoyed himself. He didn’t mind the pain, not to say that he probably got off on it. His preferences had seemed weird to Brian at first, but soon he realised that he wasn’t in any position to complain about somebody’s kinks as long as he shagged his underage pupils behind school hours. So he had decided to just go with Roger's kinks, especially when finding that he quite liked it as well. It had been something completely different than what he had been used to with John, but soon, he had to admit that though he certainly loved the privilege of someone as go-with-the-flow as John, he couldn’t get enough of Roger’s ever-lasting lust and sincere approval for everything he wanted to do with him. John only allowed him to shag him for the reward of a good grade; Roger let him because he genuinely loved getting plugged up the ass, being manhandled, being pushed around. He _loved_ it and he needed it so _badly_ that he would do anything to drive his teacher wild, both emotionally and sexually; he’d do everything to get him all riled up and then offer him to release his frustration on him, which was now.

‘Please, mister May, _please_ – oh fuck, come on, I know you want it,’ Roger panted helplessly beneath him, and agreeing on this statement, Brian forced himself inside of him with one quick thrust, making Roger scream in an indistinguishable mixture of pleasure and pain. Brian didn’t stop though, knowing that despite the searing pain, quitting now was the _last_ thing Roger wanted. He forced himself in before he pulled out slowly, until just the tip of his cock was inside of Roger, before he pushed again, making his way inside of him in one long, slow drag, not stopping before he was as far in as possible. Roger was shouting and panting and writhing beneath him, and Brian gripped his right arm, forcing it on his back. Roger gasped.

‘Don’t scream like that, or do you want me to get out of you to bind your mouth with your tie? So you can’t make any noise?’ Roger just whined, but he probably understood that he had to be quieter.

‘No, don- don’t do that, mister May! I’ll be good – oh, fuck!’ Roger gritted, and Brian, satisfied with his response, let go of his arm, since he needed both hands to grab Roger’s sides as he started to pound more seriously into him, reducing the younger boy to a helpless mess beneath him. He couldn’t help enjoying seeing Roger like this; Roger, always loud and cheeky and impudent, could be turned in something so different by him. Still he was loud and cheeky, but obedient and helpless at the same time, now his upper body was forced onto the surface of the table and his legs were hanging over the edge of the desk without being able to reach the floor. Roger was wild an restless at first, kicking his legs and clawing at the surface beneath him, but he soon gave in and adapted to Brian’s steady rhythm, meeting his hips with every movement, clinging onto the table leaf as the feeling of having that sweet spot deep inside of him hit time after time started to overwhelm him. Wordless pleads and moans spilled from his lips as he unsuccessfully tried to rub himself off against the table, for which Brian punished him by giving his bare bottom a resounding _smack!_ that probably turned him on rather than that it scared him.

‘Ow – ugh…’ Roger groaned, his voice sounding like sex over broken glass, and Brian had to cut back a moan in order to still be able to come across dominantly to his personal plaything, instead of just letting himself reduce to an incoherent murmuring as well.

‘Don’t do that. You’re gonna come with my cock and nothing else,’ Brian informed him sternly.

‘Really?’ Roger managed in between his grunts. ‘You might have to… to pick up your game, then,’ he teased, resulting in Brian pulling almost completely out before ramming all the way home again, making Roger squeal and almost scramble off the desk.

‘Watch it,’ Brian warned him quasi-indignantly, while he actually knew that the both of them loved this kind of treatment and gladly continued it, Roger’s muffled moans growing stronger as Brian pounded into him time after time.

 _This is so fucking wrong,_ Brian thought dimly, but in the heat of the moment, he couldn’t stop the uncontrollable bucking of his hips that tried to bring him to his orgasm. He was so damn close and he could feel his orgasm approaching from somewhere deep inside of him; Roger’s impudent words were even more of an encouragement to him. Physically it felt overwhelmingly amazing, but emotionally, he knew that what he was going was so damn illegal. Roger was a minor, a high school boy, and most of all, _his_ _student_. Every single teacher in the damned country knew that it was a capital crime to approach a student in any unprofessional way, let alone mindlessly shag them after the last bell had rung and the school was abandoned by everybody except for them.

But all of his moral objections vanished when after a particularly powerful thrust, Roger tightened around him, and Brian finally lost it and emptied himself inside of him with a glorious sound, the younger boy moaning in pleasure when he filled him up. He loved  seeing Roger enjoying himself just as much as he did himself, and though he hadn’t caught a glimpse of the boy’s cock yet, he knew by experience that he must be rock hard by now, something he could make use of perfectly now.

Leaning in closer to Roger, Brian asked him: ‘So are you going to listen to me next time and not make sexual remarks in class anymore?’

‘Yes, yesyesyes I’ll listen to you next time,’ Roger whimpered hastily, even though Brian knew he meant quite the opposite. He wouldn’t have wanted it any other way though, knowing that once Roger would stop teasing him in class, he wouldn’t have any reason to ‘punish’ him. Speaking of which…

‘You better do, because next time I’ll certainly send you to the headmaster,’ Brian lied, the both of them knowing that he would never do so. It was just part of their game; as if to put right why they were doing this, as if the act of having sex with a student would become less legal if it was an alternate punishment that Roger chose instead of being sent to the headmaster.

Roger seemed to find a moment just long enough to pipe up a sarcastic ‘sure you will,’ before a vindictive thrust shut him up quite effectively.

‘Good boy,’ Brian purred. ‘And you promise you won’t change the lines I’m assigning you?’

When the answer was, after a few naughty comments, a desperate ‘yes,’ Brian decided that it was good enough, and he fumbled to get his arm between Roger’s body in the table, reaching for this cock that was – as expected – completely hard and ready for release. Jerking him off quickly, Brian enjoyed his own orgasm that rippling through him, until he eventually heard a muffled scream that, together with the sudden hot substance filling the palm of his hand, announced that Roger had finished, too. Roger went completely limp beneath him while his orgasm seemed to reach every muscle in his body, murmuring softly to himself during the desirable process.

Chests were heaving, bodies were shaking, and Brian wiped the pearls of sweat from his forehead. _God, that was a wild ride, literally and figuratively,_ he thought to himself. He waited until his dick was completely limp again before he pulled out of Roger, yanking his clothes back in place and zipping up his trousers for the second time that day. By then, Roger also seemed to have gathered the power to stand up again and refashion his uniform. His recovery after just having been brutally taken from behind was always breathtakingly fast, especially when you compared it to John, who – even though Brian was way, way, more careful with him, always found it difficult to just stand up again and live his life as if nothing had ever happened. Which was understandable, of course.

‘For heaven’s sake, mister May, you were surely in need of someone to shag, and also probably for longer than just the moment I walked in on you,’ Roger chanted cheerfully, completely delighted after their almost daily happening.

 _Oh, you have no idea,_ Brian thought to himself. _I can hardly contain myself all day long with all of you around, and once I’ve had John, I’m really in the mood for something rougher._ Whilst John could be considered as a warming-up, Roger was the _real_ work, the one who he could treat in a harsher and rougher way than he would ever even consider treating John with. John was a perfect start, a perfect build-up, before letting everything out on Roger. He decided not to share this sensitive data with him, of course. ‘Oh, hush, you,’ Brian said instead as he rolled his eyes, but he couldn’t oppress a small smile of agreement that tugged at the corners of his lips.

‘You can also just tell me next time. I’m always in for a quick one somewhere in a broom closet during lunch break,’ the blond boy winked at him, and Brian sighed.

‘Not a word,’ Brian answered, cursing under his breath when he felt  his cock twitch at those words. _Damnit, you’ve just screwed two of your students in less than thirty minutes,_ he reproved himself. _Can’t you just contain yourself for once in a lifetime?_

Trying to distract himself and prevent himself from growing hard again, Brian made his way towards the front of the class, picking up the board eraser and starting to brush off the formulas that he had chalked on the green surface of the chalkboard earlier that day. Roger, probably understanding his gesture, went the other way, towards the desk that he had thrown his schoolbag on, starting to fiddle about with the small amount of supplies he had brought today, most of which didn’t even have a purpose here at school. It was silent for a moment before Roger was the first to pick up the conversation.

'I crossed John in the hallway,’ he told him calmly. This one unexpected, innocent sounding sentence he spoke, almost made Brian drop the board eraser he held in hands. He managed to cling onto it, though, preventing it from falling to the ground, but the circle movements he had previously been drawing along the surface of the chalkboard suddenly stopped. Oh, heaven. He suddenly relived the flashback of Roger running into the classroom barely thirty seconds after John had left. _Of course_ they had met each other in the hallway. Brian hoped so incredibly badly that he wasn’t suspecting anything as he replied.

'Really?' Brian eventually managed to utter in his most unsuspecting voice, starting to scrub the chalkboard again with trembling hands. Roger just nodded in response. He was still holding his head down as he pushed an English literature book back into, before he suddenly looked up at him.

'I was just wondering what you’ve said to him. He seemed upset,' Roger shrugged as if to appear indifferent, but his voice, that was dripping with emotion, betrayed him. He always tried to come across als cool and relaxed as possible, pretending not to care about what anyone said or thought about him at all. But Brian had found out a long time ago that John was his weak spot, the person he would do anything for, the one he would defend through everything. He had always been protective towards the youngest student of the class and made sure nothing bad would happen or be said to him as long as he was around. Brian normally found this pretty cute, but right now, it scared him immensely; Roger would probably _kill_ him if he was to ever find out that Brian was blackmailing and raping his best friend and secret crush.

Brian coughed softly, hoping his voice would be stable enough not to draw any negative attention when he replied. 'Nothing out of the ordinary. We just talked about his test and how he doesn't seem to perform at his best lately. I was afraid there would be something that might be distracting him from his school work lately, but he said there wasn’t,' Brian lied, feeling so damn guilty that doing so was so easy.

'Is that all? I don't know what you've told him, but he normally doesn't cry from out of nowhere,' Roger stated, and it sounded more than slightly accusatorily. Not that Brian cared at the moment, though – he was focussing on a different aspect of his words.

 _John had been crying. This is literally the last thing I need right now. What if he told Roger? What if he told anyone at all about what I’ve been doing to him? Knowing John and his shyness, the chance is small that he would decide to inform anyone about it, but what if someone was to find out on their own?_ _Oh, dear lord, please don’t let Roger or anyone else in general find out about the way I’ve been treating him._

Luckily, when Brian remained silent for some seconds, trying to think of an answer, Roger took the lead and unknowingly confirmed that he probably didn’t have a clue of what was going on between his teacher and his best friend.

‘Listen, he wouldn’t tell me why he was crying,’ Roger started, sounding more than a little hurt and distressed that his best friend wouldn’t tell him what had happened, ‘and I have no clue either. But I figure it was something you said about his last test that didn’t go too well. You aren’t the kind of teacher to get mad at him or make fun of him or anything else that would hurt him, but still, he seemed pretty upset by something you said or did.’

Brian nearly sighed in relief now Roger didn’t seem to be onto them, and proceeded to apologise. ‘I… I’m really sorry, I thought I had brought the news carefully enough, knowing that he can’t take failure very well. I’m very sorry I made him cry. That was never my intention,’ he answered, and Roger nodded.

‘I know you never meant to, but I just wanted to ask you… to please be careful with him. John is more sensitive than his quietness and withdrawnness might make you think.’ Brian nodded, knowing exactly what he meant - he had grown to find out just how sensitive was and just how badly he tried to hide this during the many after class appointments. Roger continued his monologue in a softer but still just as serious voice. ‘So please… watch what you say to him. I’m not asking you this because I think John can’t be told that he didn’t do well when he messed up a test, but because I’m his friend and I’m concerned about him.’

Roger’s careful words really made an impression on Brian – not to say that through everything, they practically made him melt inside. It was heart-warming to hear how Roger looked after John and how concerned he was about his well-being. It confirmed his suspicions that these two would most definitely make a cute couple; the way Roger looked after John and did everything to make the shy boy feel safe, the way John clamped onto Roger as if he was his only source of hope and joy. They could be so good together, a perfect mixture of innocence and baldness, playfulness and seriousness, and they didn’t even seem to know.

‘I promise I’ll watch my words very carefully,’ Brian pledged with a lump in his throat, and Roger smiled gratefully at his teacher, who now put the board wipe down and sat down on his chair behind his desk.

‘Thank you, mister May,’ Roger said as he swung the strap of his school bag over his shoulder, which was a sign that he was preparing to leave.

‘No problem. I hope John realises how lucky he is to have a friend that looks after him so well,’ Brian found himself saying before he even noticed, and Roger looked up at him.

‘Well, that’s… that’s what friends do, don’t they?’ Roger smiled insecurely when Brian brought up the name of his friend, the pink blush that instantly crept up his cheeks indicating that he was so much more than just that to Roger.

_Oh Roger, the things you do for him and the way he looks at you, are so much more than ‘just things friends do for each other,’ and I wished the two of you weren’t so blind for each other._

‘Exactly,’ Brian falsely agreed, offering him a smile. ‘I’ll see you tomorrow. And I’m warning you – no sexual remarks in class again,’ he tried to say as sternly as possible, but his heart wasn’t in the conversation – all he could think about was that Roger had seen John crying after he had walked out of his classroom. After he had pretty much sexually assaulted him. Roger hadn’t seemed to be too suspicious, and he probably would never think of shy, reserved John selling his body to their maths teacher, but Roger certainly was worried about his friend. And worry was usually not a good combination with secrets that were supposed to stay secret for evermore. What if he was going to start talking, asking, prying into John’s conscience? What if the younger student yielded for the soft but insisting voice, the smooth use of language, and cutest puppy eyes that Roger was famous for? What if he caught John in a particularly variable mood, or on the nerve of a nervous breakdown, looking for someone he trusted that he could confide his secret, that at the same time was his worst nightmare, to?

‘Roger?’ Brian called out his name, and the boy stopped to turn around and look at him.

‘Yes, mister?’ he asked, sounding slightly disturbed by the fact that Brian had called him back.

‘This whole… thing… we have going on…' Brian started, finding interest in his finger nails when Roger looked curiously at him. 'It’s between the two of us and no one else, right?’

‘Of course it is. You shouldn’t have to ask,' Roger responded instantly, staring at Brian as if he couldn't believe he would feel the need to ask him that. ‘Or don’t you trust me?’ he added in a whisper, a frown forming on his forehead.

‘What? No, of course I do. I just needed to hear it from you,’ Brian assured, rearranging the pile of papers on his desk for what must have been at least the fifth time that day.

Roger looked slightly sceptical, but eventually seemed to accept the explanation. ‘It’s between us and it will stay between us. No one else will ever know,’ he promised, before he turned around on his heel and left the classroom, and with that, his still incredibly troubled teacher behind. The one, ever-lasting nightmare that all of this would be out in the open one day, crept up in his mind again, making his heart pound in his chest. It wasn't that he didn't trust the pretty blond troublemaker that had just walked out of the classroom, and it certainly wasn't the case that he didn't trust John to keep their dirty little secret. It was more that he didn't trust the world around them.

Because what if someone found out? What if someone would get suspicious and interrogated either John or Roger?  Or what if someone went to the headmaster and had him called to the principal to explain what was going on? Or, worst case scenario, what if someone was to walk in on them while they were at it-

 _Get yourself together, Brian Harold May,_ he reproved himself sternly. _Nobody will find out.  Nobody will ever find out as long as you make sure these two don't find out about the relation they have with you. As long as they don't know about each other or to anyone else, then who else is ever going to know?_

Keeping this thought in mind to comfort himself, Brian pushed the stack of maths papers into his briefcase, having to oppress the tendency to just tear apart and throw away John's test that was right on top of it. But as expected, it didn't work - he knew it was never going to work as long as the sounds of Roger's lustful cries and the image of John's tightly closed eyes were following him everywhere he went.

Brian walked out of the classroom that had functioned as a bedroom twice that day, locking the door behind him and cursing it once again for not being closable on the inside. He hardly dared to greet the janitor when he crossed the middle-aged man in the hallway, afraid he might have heard something. When the man just walked past him with a short, kind-hearted nod of his head, Brian relaxed slightly, but not completely. He knew he was never really going to get his peace of mind as long as these practices were going to continue, as long as the fear of somebody finding out was present and haunting him with every step he took.

 _Calm down. No one is ever going to know as long as the three of you keep quiet,_ he insisted to try and ease his worried mind, but he didn't even manage to convince himself.

Because of this underlying uneasiness, the feeling that the secret wasn't just among the three of them anymore, it hardly surprised Brian to find out the very next day that there was, in fact, somebody who knew. There was _always_ somebody who knew. And this time, it was the very person who had unknowingly and undeliberately gotten him into this situation, who had found out. The fourth person who had unknowingly and undeliberately become part of this messed up situation. The person Brian hadn't thought about in the middle of the commotion of that particularly hectic day, even though he realised that this person, being both his student and his boyfriend, might be the most risky piece in his dangerous game.


	2. Chapter 2

Sitting at his desk at half past seven the next morning, Brian tried to grade the last tests in order to fulfil the promise he had made to this eleventh year maths class, but he couldn’t focus on the algebraic calculations at all. He uneasily shifted in his chair, rolled his red pencil between his thumb- and forefinger, and most of all, he kept glancing at the clock multiple times each minute, cursing the mechanism with every passing second. His first class of the day was going to come in at quarter past eight, and he had promised to have the notes to their algebra test today. After yesterday’s events, he hadn’t managed to pull himself together and check the last three tests before the next day, so he had decided to leave his home early today and work - _struggle_ , rather - to finish his task in the morning before his first class would come running in.

But even now, he couldn’t concentrate on the paper in front of him. He couldn’t keep his focus on a maths assignment for longer than fifteen seconds, since all he could think about was the blackmail triangle he had trapped himself and his students in. Normally, he didn’t feel as guilty and as awful about taking advantage of Roger and John like he did right now; it always troubled him, but he had never been as broken afterwards as this time. He couldn’t quite tell why yesterday had shocked him so much; maybe it was because he had been afraid Roger was starting to find out about what he was doing to John, or maybe it was just the realisation that doing this was so messed up towards everyone involved. The ever-lasting fear of someone finding out was starting to wear down on him, making him unable to function properly, making him feel like he was going to break down any moment. With every sound, ever sudden movement, every unexpected spoken word that might announce that he had been caught, Brian felt himself shifting closer to the mental abyss. He knew that this had to stop, this had to stop immediately, this had never meant to start in the first place-

 _Not now,_ he reminded himself. _Finish these bloody tests and pretend like nothing is going on when your class comes in. You_ _’_ _ll only draw suspicion if you don_ _’_ _t seem mentally stable now. You can think about how to solve this whole dilemma with John and Roger another time, but not now, not now that you have tests to finish and a promise to fulfill._

Brian picked up his pencil again, managing to write down one correction to an answer with his shaky hand, before he lapsed in- and out of absent-mindedness towards the test again. When a knock on the door announced the arrival of one of his pupils, he nearly threw the pencil and paper aside in frustration. Another time, another place, Brian wouldn’t have minded to help somebody out with a mathematical question before class, but he had promised his students that he would have their notes this time, so the last thing he needed right now was something else than just his own troubled mind to distract him from his work.

‘Yes?’ Brian called out with an irritated sigh, but he lost his cold attitude once he recognised the voice - and the choice of words even more - of the person who spoke to him right in time with the act of entering his abandoned classroom.

'Is that how you greet your boyfriend, dear?’

Brian, more than shocked to find this specific student walking in on him at this specific point in time, just gaped at him without uttering a word. The two of them were both awfully aware of the risks that a student-teacher relationship brought alone, and they had therefore agreed not to meet each other at school for that reason. But that his boyfriend, being the tease he was, frequently couldn’t oppress the tendency of calling him 'dear’ or 'darling’ in class, was one thing; that he also seemed to feel the need to show up before school officially started, was a whole new level of risk-taking, which only added up to the list of things Brian had built up overtime to worry about.

'Freddie-’ he managed to choke out, and the younger boy just winked at him. In his white dress shirt, dark blue blazer, black trousers and matching tie that made up the dress code of the school, he looked just like the rest of his students, and yet there was something so different, so remarkable about the Persian boy that had Brian drawn to him. Maybe it was because of the way he wore his school uniform both casually and on point, maybe it was something in the way he slowly, almost sensually blinked those capturing dark eyes; it could have been the sharp features and the black hair that was slightly longer than most of society would approve of, or the way he gracefully moved his thin body. Maybe it was in something in the way that he was so paradoxically attractive; his clearly well-taken care of, but at the same time casual looks; his prominent intelligence that he preferred not to always bring out (and especially not in the subjects he disliked); his shy yet confident personality that could either fill the room or vanish in the distance whenever he wanted.

Or maybe it was just him in general, everything he was and everything he had, and everything he willingly gave to Brian, who gladly offered him his heart and soul as well.

'What? Am I not getting a kiss this time?’ Freddie snickered at him, and by the smirk plastered across his face, Brian could tell that he was blissfully aware of the risks he was taking by dropping by at this time in this context. Knowing his lover, he _certainly_ hadn’t come in to ask him something about the binomial distribution. Then, only to intensify the teacher’s state of shock, Freddie added a reproachful: 'Or are you saving them for other people?’

 _Oh, God, please let that just be a teasing joke, and please tell me that he doesn_ _’_ _t know anything about what_ _’_ _s going on._ Quickly, Brian managed to regain his composure and started another topic to distract Freddie from whatever was the meaning behind the sentence he had just said to him. 'You can’t come around to see me at this time, and you know that. Just like you know that you can’t call me 'dear’ in public like yesterday, even if it’s just for fun. You might draw the attention of other people,’ he whispered, quickly peering over at the door to make sure it had been closed properly.

'That is _exactly_ what I wanted to talk to you about.’ Freddie’s self-satisfied expression changed into a malicious one when he strode over to his teacher and partner at the same time. Brian’s shock and surprise were huge when he was pulled out of his chair by Freddie, who had gripped his arm in one shift moment and now pressed him down, his back dumping against the surface of his desk. The chair clattered onto the floor, the maths books and pencils on his desk were pushed aside, but neither of them minded – Brian was too overwhelmed with surprise to do so, and Freddie clearly had other things on his mind to talk about.

'What are you-’ Brian gasped, but he was soon cut off by the sound of a zipper - _his_ zipper, to be more precisely - being dragged down.

'I can’t call you dear in public, or see you before school, but you can go around fucking my best friends behind closed curtains?!’ Freddie’s voice got louder, more powerful when the end of the sentence neared, and Brian’s eyes fell shut. This was the moment he had feared for all those months; these were the words he had dreaded to hear for way too long. The moment of somebody having found out about his illegal practices with underage pupils. The moment after which everything was going to change; the moment after which he would no longer be seen as a dreamy young maths teacher who secretly pursued a career in music, but a criminal, an sex offender, a child predator who had to be locked up behind bars for evermore, not to ever face daylight again.

And the worst thing was that, from all people around, it was Freddie who had to find out first. Freddie, his boyfriend, the person who he truly loved with all his heart, the person he had never wanted to hurt in any possible way. The person who deserved so much better than having to find out that his partner was having sex with – not to say, sexually molesting – two of his best friends.

‘You… you _know_ ,’ Brian eventually managed in the smallest voice that was all he was able to produce, and Freddie let out a senseless chuckle.

‘Yes, I do. That’s pretty unfortunate, isn’t?’ Freddie jeered, pulling down his victim’s trousers and underwear in one sudden movement, skilfull and swift like only he could, leaving Brian naked from the waist down. Brian dimly realised that this was supposed to be awfully humiliating, but he had other things on his mind, things way more serious than your boyfriend undressing you without your consent – things like having cheated on your boyfriend by sexually molesting his two best friends and undoubtedly facing imprisonment when the story was going to come out, which couldn’t take very long from now off.

'Who told you?’ Brian wanted to ask, but he ended up gasping when the question fell off his lips right in time with Freddie wrapped his hand around his dick.

'Nobody. I figured it out myself,’ Freddie sneered at him. 'You were starting to draw my attention by letting John and Roger stay after school time. Can you believe that? I can’t call you ‘dear’ in public because that might draw suspicions, but you mindlessly plugg my friends up the ass five minutes after having dismissed the class,’ Freddie mocked, dark eyes gleaming as he stroked Brian insistently, punishingly, raking his nails over the sensitive skin of his cock. Brian growled at the highly unpleasurable touch, but this was nothing compared to Freddie’s words of anger, disappointment and hurt. It only took a few seconds for Brian to realise that this was the most painful combination of emotions he could ever hear coming from his boyfriend, and he felt so, _so_ bad about hurting him.

And then, just as he thought he was going to break down in tears of shame and regret, Freddie reminded him of how it all had started; the favour Freddie had asked him to please do for him and his friends, the one innocent request that Brian had managed to turn around, the harmless thing that he had somehow turned into a complete chaos.

'Being my boyfriend, I asked you to help me set Roger and John up together! I wanted you to help me to get them to hook up, not for you to lure them into your classroom and fuck them behind my back!’ Freddie cried, so overcome with anger and disbelief that he had to pause for a few seconds before he could continue his monologue again. ‘Instead of just pairing them up for a maths project so they could spend some more time together at school or something innocent like that to help them show how well they would go together, you sexually blackmailed them into some kind of love triangle! Love rectangle, if you count me in!’ Freddie cried, and Brian dimly thought that the new ‘love rectangle’ phrase he had just coined would have been funny if it had been purely hypothetical, and not the harsh reality they had stumbled upon.

'I never meant to- oh, fuck!’ Brian mewled when Freddie gripped his pulsing erection viciously tight. The power Freddie held over him would have been unbearably hot another time, but now that it was purely punishment and torture, it wasn’t meant to be enjoyable, and it certainly wasn’t either. It was harsh and painful and frustrating, and Brian wished Freddie could give him more of it, give him more of the pain he deserved to go through for his actions.

'You never meant what? You never meant to start cheating on me with them? You never meant to start raping them? It just happened?’ Freddie asked dangerously, hand slow but painfully tight.

That last, sarcastic remark was what actually managed to make Brian think through the clouded haze of lust and shame that was his mind at the moment. It would be stupid to say that it ‘just happened’. Not a single beginning maths teacher 'just happens’ to end up sexually exploiting two students while getting into a serious relationship with a third one. But no matter how stupid this explanation was, if you could even call it an explanation at all, it was all Brian could come up with at the moment. Whether Freddie believed it or not, the affairs had slowly, gradually started at a moment in time that Brian couldn’t exactly pinpoint – be it with him being fully conscious of the possible consequences of it, but without him deliberately reaching for his aim. It had started, and before he realised what he was doing, he had already been entangled in a web of secrets, cheating and blackmail.

_Sometimes you don_ _’t know exactly how wrong certain things are until you_ _’re in too deep to escape._

Realising this wasn’t a good moment to say that, Brian just weakly shook his head to the question, not uttering a word. In a wordless response to his silence, Freddie moved his thumb over the tip of his cock, pushing his foreskin down and making him keen at the painful mean of punishment.

'You are such a fucking… I don’t know, I don’t even have a word that would describe how I feel about you right now, you know that? Roger is one thing, but John, out of all people! _John_! How _could_ you?!’ Freddie shouted the question Brian had asked himself a million times before as well, and it would have made Brian shiver to the core if his body hadn’t been so warm from the tension and stress, and not to forget, from Freddie’s wicked hands that were something he miraculously managed not to focus on for a moment as he let the question he had been asked whirl through his guilty mind.

How could he ever have done this? How could he ever have engaged into practices like this? How could he have ever made a deal with Roger to trade sex for not being sent to the principal? How could he ever have been cruel enough to manipulate John’s notes and offer him a decent grade in exchange for his body? All while he was in a more than happy relationship with Freddie, on top of that? Sweet, unexpecting Freddie, who would be patiently waiting for him in the park while he would be screwing one of his best friends into next week. Just thinking about this made him feel queasy and guilty, so _fucking_ guilty.

‘John… I didn’t do it against his will,’ Brian tried feebly in a fruitless attempt to make things sound just a little less awful. 'He gave me consent-’

'Consent? He is _fifteen_! Brian Harold May, apart from this occasion, you are not fucking _stupid_ in general, so you know damn well that that’s below the age of consent for straight people, not to even mention the age for homosexual intercourse,’ Freddie informed him sternly, as if he had just learned the complete law by heart before he went to school to tell his lover the truth. 'And I would hardly call his approval for you to fuck him ‘consent,’ given that you didn’t leave him any choice but giving in! What you’ve been doing is plain blackmail and rape! Not to even mention that he’s your student and approaching him in any way is forbidden by law! You could get fired, be arrested, go to jail! And apart from all this, have you forgotten that you’re with _me_?!’

And there it was; there Freddie had just enumerated all the reasons why it was so fucking wrong to ever engage in the kind of practices he had gotten himself into, and Brian knew that there was no use denying any of them.

'I know,’ he whispered. 'I know, I know, and I can’t even start telling you how sorry I am,’ Brian added in a squeak, bowing his head down to prevent Freddie from seeing the tears by letting his dark brown curls falling in front of his sorrowful face.

‘You are un-be-fucking-lievable,’ Freddie gritted out as he hard-handedly pushed Brian down on the desk again, his other hand moving faster along Brian’s now throbbing erection. The way he clenched his fingers around him was painfully tight, viciously tight, and Brian had to bite down his bottom lip in order to keep himself from crying out. ‘What the fuck is _wrong_ with you?! Have you got any idea what you’ve gotten yourself and all of us into?!’ Freddie snapped, and Brian felt the first tears escaping his eyes at those words. He knew he deserved it, but he _hated_ being snapped at, especially by someone who was close to him, and he let down the remains of his composure.

‘I’m so sorry,’ Brian squeaked as he moved his hand to wipe the tears away, but Freddie forced his wrist down on the desktop beneath him in an unexpectedly strong and sudden movement, making him shriek at just his alertness.

‘No, that’s right. Cry, let me see how sorry you are. Let me see that you’re still human after all, Goddamnit!’ Freddie shouted with tears of what seemed to be anger and helplessness in his eyes, which made Brian feel even worse than he already did. Seeing Freddie being hurt was one of the worst things he could ever witness, especially now he knew that it was all his fault. Brian wished he could wipe the tears off his face, wished he could hush him and tell him that it was all one big mistake, but he couldn’t, because Freddie wasn’t mistaken – everything he had accused him of was nothing but the ugly truth. Therefore, everything he could do was let the silent tears pass as Freddie worked him mercilessly while throwing around his completely justified accusations.

‘It’s not fair! It’s not fair, Brian, for God’s sake! What did we ever do to deserve this?!’ Freddie cried out while his hand was still moving along Brian’s shaft, both teasing and punishing at the same time. ‘The ‘arrangements’ you made with Roger are just ridiculous – no sane person would ever even think of such a thing, let alone actually do it! And John…’ Freddie started, his loud voice suddenly dropping to a much more delicate, vulnerable one, even his expression growing a bit softer, a bit more distant – almost just like John’s, every time Brian told him about a fake bad grade that inevitably led to another after-class sex session. ‘Sweet, quiet John, who starts trembling the moment Roger reminds us that maths class is up next on our schedule, who hardly dares to look at you when you speak to him, who clamps onto Roger the moment we enter your classroom… It all makes sense now. Fuck, it’s nauseating just to think about you raping him! Why the fuck would you to that to anybody, let alone to him?!’ Freddie’s voice had gained stability and strength again, the combination of this and his words making Brian sob quietly, cursing himself for getting harder with each of the ceaseless movements of Freddie’s hands down his nether regions.

‘I don’t know,’ he whispered, tears dripping off his eyelashes when he closed his eyes. ‘I never meant to h-hurt him, honestly-’

‘But you did!’ Freddie interrupted him. ‘You hurt him, and Roger, and with that, you hurt me! You raped my best friends, you cheated on me, for crying out loud!’ Then, softer, as if his voice failed him, Freddie added: ‘I trusted you, with all my heart, and you did this to me. You… you _hurt_ me.’

 _I hurt him. I hurt him, I hurt Roger, I hurt John, and I hurt him._ The words echoed through Brian’s mind time after time, until all of his thoughts were washed away when a particularly well-coordinated touch made him lose the last control he had over his body. He gasped when Freddie finished him off with a flick of his wrist, but contrary to all the other times Freddie had managed to make him come by using just his fingers, he didn’t feel euphoric at all now; it felt empty and misplaced in the situation they were in, given that touching him had been more but a mean to humiliate him and to make him admit what he had done instead of just for sexual pleasure. But Brian couldn’t blame Freddie for using sex to blackmail him with; Brian had done the exact same thing to his best friends, something Freddie had now found out. No, he certainly couldn’t blame him; he wished he would give him punishment way worse than this, knowing that he deserved it. He deserved to be slapped in the face, be pushed to the floor and be kicked at, to be scolded at and every other way that someone could come up with to treat a child molester with. Because that was what he was, he realised - he had taken advance of two minors on sexual area, one clearly against his will and one with questionable consent. But instead of that, Freddie remained calm and reasonable, which Brian soon found out was even worse.

‘I’m so fucking _sorry_ ,’ Brian squeaked, before the first real tears started streaming down his face.

'I know you are sorry, because this is not who you are,’ Freddie spoke softly, sounding much wiser than his actual seventeen years when he spoke these words to his boyfriend, who was covering his face with his hands as he sobbed quietly, not wanting to show off his ways of expressing his repentance, even though he knew his boyfriend could feel it in the air clinging around him and hear it in the erratic sobs he emitted.

‘Brian, look at me,’ Freddie said as he helped Brian to sit up straight on the desk and pushed his hands aside, calmly and carefully this time. 'This isn’t you as the quiet, kind, relaxed but serious young maths teacher who came to this school because he truly believed he could make a change in education.’ Then, quietly, he added: 'This isn’t the man I fell in love with.’

The hurt and disappointment dripping off Freddie’s voice was the worst thing Brian had ever heard.

'I’m so sorry,’ Brian whispered between sobs, not managing to look up at him. 'I truly am, I’m so sorry, I- I never wanted for this to h-happen,’ he said, his voice breaking at the end of the sentence.

'Then tell me why it happened,’ Freddie encouraged, joining his partner on the desk and sitting next to him with an arm loosely wrapped around his waist. Brian blushed slightly as he pulled up his trousers and tucked himself in again with trembling hands, before starting to tell Freddie what happened with a voice that was just as shaky as the rest of his body. Freddie simply let him talk; he didn’t interrupt Brian while he began telling the story from his side, starting with the things they both remembered; the moment Freddie shared his thoughts about Roger and John probably being very good together and him asking Brian to help him pair them up. Brian being hesitant about meddling with his students at first, but eventually agreeing with pairing them up as project partners, just to do Freddie a favour. Freddie asking him to take them apart after class sometimes, which was the point that Brian regarded as where it all went downhill faster than he could ever have imagined. After that, everything Brian told him was new to Freddie – while the student had been thinking Brian was helping him to match his friends, he was in full oblivion of what his boyfriend had actually been doing behind his back all the time.

With audible shame, guilt and difficulty, Brian managed to tell him about the first time he had let John stay after class to talk to hopefully find some details about his relationship regarding Roger. He had found a valid reason to let him stay by telling him he wanted to talk to him about the test he had been grading at the moment. Brian thought this would be an effective way to start a conversation with him, but unfortunately, the thought of having to stay after class had seemed to be simply _terrifying_ to John. By the time the whole class had left and Brian was all alone in the room with John, the boy had been literally shaking with fear and his face had been the whitest shade of pale Brian had ever seen. Though he hadn’t even mentioned anything about his test, neither in a positive nor in a negative sense, John seemed to think that he had messed up so badly that his teacher wanted to ask him what on earth was wrong with him, and he instantly started pleading Brian to please not give him a fail mark, to please give him another chance. Told him he’d do _anything_ for a second chance – and the concept of ‘anything’ was something Brian had managed to draw out of proportion by offering him a higher grade, even though there was nothing wrong with his initial grade, if he would sell his body to him.

And against all odds, John _did_. Brian had been greatly surprised by this – he knew that John was shy and reticent and he didn’t think John had ever been romantically, let alone sexually close to somebody. But then he realised how much work John put into school and how one particularly bad grade could ruin his unbelievably high average grade for maths, which eventually could influence his chances of being admitted to university, not to even mention how afraid he seemed to be of rejection or disappointing the people around him. Brian later understood that all of this together made sure that John didn’t have a choice but giving in to his proposal, whether he liked it or not.

Though he felt so fucking _guilty_ after he had first lured John into sexual activities by making up stories about bad grades, Brian soon discovered that he wanted more of his shyest student and that he could easily achieve more after-class meetings with him. By purposely giving John a bad grade and then offer him the opportunity of trading sex for a more decent grade, knowing that his straight A-student who seemed to be suffering from a severe fear of failure could never say no to this, he was assured of John being completely at his fingertips, under his thumb, under his spell. He knew how evil and immoral and maybe even _dangerous_ it was to play with John’s feelings and body the way he did, but he felt himself too drawn to the idea of possessing John through his grades to stop his deeds, even if this meant he had to lie to, blackmail, and maybe even threaten his student. Luckily, it had never gotten to the point where he actually had to threaten John, because the boy was too shy and dutiful to disobey him in any way and never needed any form of threat to do as he was told. Brian was also sure he was too ashamed to tell anyone about the sexual abuse, so his position seemed to be safe enough to just continue ‘the deal’, while in the meantime, under the pressure of Freddie, Brian was starting to focus on Roger, too.

Roger’s story wasn’t as pathetic as John’s was, but it was still shocking for Freddie to hear – and for Brian to realise – how his attempts to let Roger stay after class to talk to him about his conduct in order to carefully bend the conversation towards his friendship with John, had soon turned into make-up sessions for his provocative behaviour. The silent contract between the two of them, which basically dictated that Roger could get away with anything as long as he would let Brian have full access of his body afterwards, had formed in just a matter of a week and had never stopped. Instead, it had only seemed to make the student behave even more outrageously now that he knew what he could get for his impudence. It wasn’t any longer just an interesting game to test Mister May’s borders, but it had turned into a desperate request for filthy sex sessions from both sides. The frequency of their meetings had also intensified abnormally, since Roger tried just about _everything_ to get ‘detention’, preferably every day of the week, though Brian didn’t always give in to this desire – some days were reserved for John. Though lately, he didn’t even separate their time anymore; he would just send one of them away for a moment while settling things with the other, all of which happened while Freddie would be waiting patiently for Brian ‘to finish correcting the last tests’.

At this point, Brian could not decide which lie or which crime was worse than the other anymore.

'I have no idea how to respond to this apart from that this has to _stop_ ,’ was the first thing Freddie said hoarsely to Brian when he had told him everything he had to know about the illegal affairs, as if all the power had gradually been drained out of his body and voice during Brian’s monologue. ‘This is so wrong and unfair and plainly illegal, Brian. You know you can go to jail for this.’

'I know. I know it has to stop, and I know I will have to go to jail once somebody finds out,’ Brian replied, before it suddenly hit him. He was still talking about the situation as if nobody knew about it, while in reality, his boyfriend had just found out about the crimes he had committed. He realised that he his safety, his life as a free man was hanging by a tread that could easily be cut if Freddie felt even the slightest spirit for revenge –no, that wasn’t the right word. Justice, he corrected himself in his thoughts. It would have been nothing but _justice_ if Freddie would go to a person of authority and enlighten them about the events. Still, the thought of being turned in and arrested made Brian shiver to the core, and he had to know if Freddie was planning on doing this or not.

'Freddie? Are you… are you gonna turn me in?’ Brian asked quietly, hardly daring to utter the question, since he had absolutely no idea what to do when the answer was going to be a yes. Was he going to have to plead him not to if Freddie wanted to have him arrested for his crimes? Would he threaten him, blackmail him to talk the idea right out of his head? He soon realised that he couldn’t morally do any of these things, because they were the exact same ways he had kept Roger and mainly John under his thumb with, and he couldn’t live with himself if he did the same to his boyfriend in order to safe himself. The only thing he could do was hold his breath while Freddie looked thoughtfully at him for a second, after which he shook his head, softly at first and firmly by the time he finally broke the silence.

‘No, I’m not. I won’t tell anyone,’ Freddie confided, and a wave of relief washed over Brian. He could hardly believe that Freddie wasn’t going to turn him in, if not for his moral objections then for the sweet revenge he knew he deserved.

‘Really?’ Brian squeaked insecurely, staring at Freddie in disbelief, but when his answer once again proved that he wasn’t going to betray him, he couldn’t hold back a sob of relief while clinging onto his boyfriend, repeatedly whispering a hardly coherent ‘thankyou’ at him.

‘Really, because I can’t stand the thought of you having to go to jail. You’re still my boyfriend and I still love you, even though I’m exceptionally mad at you at the moment,’ Freddie started, his nearly sweet voice changing to a grumble at the last part of his sentence, softly trying to push Brian away from him. Brian, who had thrown his arms around him the moment he said that he still loved him, backed off slightly and kept his head down as he nodded in understanding. Freddie apparently still loved him, but it was probably too early for the boy to get physically close to him yet.

‘I know, and you have every right to be so,’ Brian told him softly.

‘Because honestly, Brian! Cheating on me with my two best friends without them knowing about one another or about me? No, cheating isn’t the right word. Sexually molesting or raping would be better, certainly in John’s case. Have you got any idea how hard I’m trying not to _slap_ you right now?’ Freddie spat out, suddenly but not unexpectedly.

‘Please do so,’ Brian said as he turned his cheek towards his boyfriend, closing his eyes and preparing for Freddie lashing out at his face so hard that it would make stars appear before his eyes, but nothing happened. ‘You… You can go ahead,’ Brian encouraged him softly. He really seemed to _crave_ someone putting him right by backhanding him across the face at the moment, knowing that he deserved it. But he should have known that Freddie wasn’t going to be the person to do that, and to his relief – or frustration – all he got was a soft pat against his cheek.

‘I might make use of this offer later on, but right now, I think I’m just too paralysed to really realise what’s going on,’ Freddie admitted. ‘But I’m warning you in advance - when I’m going to wake up from this nightmare, I can’t be held responsible for the things I’ll say or do to you,’ Freddie threatened, to which Brian could do nothing but agree. Then, after a few seconds, Freddie spoke up again. 'So I’m not going to tell anyone, but I have some conditions. Three, to be precise.’

 _That was fair_ , Brian decided. The favour Freddie did him by not informing anyone about the missteps he had committed was immense, bigger than he ever could have wished for, and Brian hadn’t had any idea how to thank him for his forgiveness until he could accede to the idea of Freddie’s three conditions. Without even knowing what they were, he nodded, knowing that no offering he was going to have to bring was going to be able to compensate with Freddie’s sacrifice to him.

'First of all - this has to stop immediately. Knowing John, this is probably tearing him apart, and no matter what he says, it’s hurtful to Roger as well,’ Freddie spoke sharply.

That wasn’t very hard for the older man to agree on. 'Of course,’ Brian nodded furiously. 'It’ll stop right away. It won’t ever happen again.’

'Good. Then, secondly, I want you to take both John, Roger and me apart, explain exactly what happened, and apologise to the three of us together,’ Freddie continued in the same stern yet nonchalant voice, as if he asked people to confess their crimes to their victims on a daily base.

Brian, on the other hand, was not as relaxed about the condition as Freddie was, since this was _not_ something he had accounted for – sure, he had agreed to do whatever Freddie wanted him to do, but he hadn’t foreseen that he would want him to do something as radical as this. Of course, he was going to stop the sexual blackmail right away, and of course he wanted to apologise to all of them if that was one of Freddie’s demands – but he wanted to do this _separately_ and _privately_. Owning up his mistakes to his three victims all at once, having all of them know about the whole situation and the other people involved was hard on a whole other level. 'What?!’

'I’m serious. I can’t live with the idea of you having done this to them without them knowing and having received an explanation and an apology. They deserve the truth, Brian.’

'I know they do, but what… What if they are furious at me? What if… if _they_ turn me in?’ After just having thought to be able to just leave this all behind because Freddie had promised not to call the police on him, the prospect of the two other possible victims looking for vengeance (no, not vengeance; turning him in would be nothing more than justice) by having him being arrested, didn’t exactly appeal to Brian.

'Well, they’ll probably be furious at you, especially Roger. Have you seen how he looks at John? He once hit somebody a black eye when he called John a nerd after having received the best grade of our science class, so when he finds out what you’ve been pulling him through…’ Freddie clicked his tongue, making the last traces of Brian’s faith in a good ending to this story disappear. ‘Let’s just say that I wouldn’t expect any sympathy from him,’ he said, then pausing a second to let this sink in. ‘As for John… He’ll probably be broken when he hears about this. But he deserves the truth just as much as Roger does.’

‘But can’t I just tell them separately?’ Brian tried in an attempt to make everything a little less painful. ‘Please, they don’t h-have to know about each other, now do they?’ Brian pleaded, but Freddie didn’t give in to his supplication.

‘Yes, they do. Brian, they’re best friends and we suspect them to end up dating pretty soon. The story will come out sooner or later, and it’s better that they hear it from you than from each other without having heard your side of the story. The chance of them reporting you when they find out themselves is bigger than the chance they do when you’re honest to them and tell them the whole story,’ Freddie reasoned, but Brian disagreed with this argumentation.

‘No, but you don’t understand!’ Brian tried helplessly. ‘I might be able to just apologise to them and urge them to keep quiet when I tell them separately, but Roger will definitely want to sue me when he hears what I’ve done to John.’

‘I know. Isn’t it cute how he would probably put John before himself?’ Freddie sighed in adoration, but Brian could not exactly appreciate his lover’s romantic side right now.

‘Freddie, this isn’t the best moment to start getting sentimental!’ Brian cried, and Freddie ran his hand through his dark brown curls to calm him down.

‘Darling, hush. People can’t hear that we’re here,’ he informed Brian, reminding both of them that they were still all alone in the empty classroom and that it was forbidden for students to enter the hallways and the classrooms before the first bell rung. ‘And of course I know that. They might wish to inform someone about these sexual missteps, and I can’t blame them, and nor can you.’ Freddie spoke sharply, and Brian kept his head down as he nodded, not being able to do anything apart from helplessly agreeing. 'But then again, just think about it. Do you think John would ever want anyone to know about this having happened?’ he asked, and Brian, not completely sure where he was going, shook his head slightly. ‘Alright, and knowing Roger’s protectiveness towards John, do you think he would bring out this story without John’s approval?’ he then asked, and suddenly it downed on Brian that the chances of getting arrested were way smaller than expected due the composition of characters of his victims, so he nodded again. ‘Listen dear, it’s not my goal to get someone to turn you in. I just want you to see what you’ve done to them and that you show your repentance, and realise what kind of risks you’ve taken by starting all this,’ Freddie explained.

'Alright,’ Brian agreed with a shivery sigh, feeling that he didn’t have much of a choice anyway; Freddie now had the power in hands with the sensitive information he possessed, and Brian knew that he had every right to turn him in for his unlawful deeds. It was a miracle that he chose not to, something Brian was immensely grateful for, though he was still down on his nerves for having to confess everything to the other two people involved. 'When does this ultimately have to happen?’

'Before we return home after class today,’ Freddie informed him without skipping a beat, while Brian was afraid his heart was simply going to give up when he heard this.

'Today?!’ That was _also_ not something the young teacher had accounted for. Of course, now that Freddie had ordered him to inform John and Roger, he wanted to get this off his chest as soon as possible, but he had expected to be given a little more time to think about how _exactly_ he was going to admit that he had been sexually exploiting the both of them while being in a relationship with their best friend all the time. Hearing that he had to tell it today already was shocking to Brian, who could do nothing but stare at Freddie.

‘Yes, today. They deserve to know as soon as possible,’ the student stated.

‘But I- what do I say to them?’ Brian squeaked, tears starting to spill from his eyes again.

'The truth, that’s what you say to them,’ Freddie seemed to permit himself to chuckle as much as his body allowed, which wasn’t much in the current situation. ‘I don’t know, dear, that’s something you’ll have to find out on your own. You got yourself into this situation, so you’re gonna have to find your way out of it as well.’

That was nothing more than fair, not to say that Freddie was actually way too soft on him. Brian couldn’t have been able to be mad at him if Freddie had beaten him up, but he knew he should have known better than that. Freddie might have been young, but he was very wise, and he probably realised that Brian would learn more from this kind of punishment than from simply attacking his body. Having to admit your crimes to the victims you’ve made and, no matter what Freddie thought they were going to do, still be completely dependent on what they wanted to do with your confession, was something that scared Brian more than any kind of corporal punishment could ever do, and Freddie probably knew that, too.

‘Brian, I know it’s not easy to confront your mistakes, or _crimes_ , rather, but I’m serious about this. I promised you that I go and tell the police or the headmaster if you agreed with my three conditions. But if you don’t, if you refuse to tell and apologise to John and Roger, I’m not going to hesitate to tell somebody of authority,’ Freddie threatened relentlessly, and though he was usually lenient, Brian didn’t doubt that he was going to do this if he didn’t listen to him.

‘No, please!’ Brian gasped, wiping a line of tears away. ‘Okay, okay, I’ll tell them,’ he promised, still keeping his head down. ‘Please, I’ll do anything, as long as you don’t tell anyone.’

‘Very good,’ Freddie praised, even though Brian didn’t feel like he was doing anything good at the moment. He didn’t feel like he could ever do anything good again after having engaged in such awful activities. But before he could even think about the proximity of ever being able to relieve his moral conscience again, he felt his heart sink down even more at a pretty recent, yet in the chaos that he was in at the moment, completely forgotten recollection – Freddie had told him he had _three_ conditions. One was stopping sexually abusing his friends immediately, which was very logical and completely doable. The second term of having to confess his sins to his victims, was incredibly hard and nerve-wracking. What if the third term was going to be even worse than that? What if the third term was something he really couldn’t fulfill, no matter how much he wanted to?

‘Freddie?’ Brian whispered, and his lover looked at him. ‘What… what is the last condition?’

The boy thought for a second, a slight frown forming on his forehead, before he smiled. ‘Oh, I almost forgot! Yes, there is one more condition. The reason why all of this started, was because I asked you to help me to try and set John and Roger up together, and you agreed to do that. So I still want you to fulfill that promise.’

Brian simply stared at Freddie for a moment, before being able to close his mouth that had dropped open when Freddie had told him about his third and final request. ‘You… After all that happened, you’re asking me to… try to get them to date?’

‘Yes, of course! Otherwise all of this would have happened for nothing, isn’t so?’ Freddie cried, and Brian sighed. No matter how absurd the request was, it failed to surprise him – it was typically Freddie to ask him to help him pair up his friends after just having found out about his crimes.

‘So? Are you doing it?’ Freddie asked when Brian stayed quiet for a moment.

‘Of… of course. I’d do anything to make up with both them and with you,’ Brian promised with the smallest of a smile. Despite everything, he couldn’t help smiling softly at Freddie’s cheerfulness and his ever-lasting optimism, always managing to turn any negative situation in a positive experience.

‘Great!’ Freddie said as he jumped up from the table, glancing over at the clock that displayed a time of one minute to eight, which meant that the school bell would soon announce the beginning of the first class, and with that, the arrival of hordes of teenage boys who absolutely weren’t allowed to find out about their secret encounter, let alone the subject of it. ‘I have art class now, but I’ll see you in a few hours. Think about what you’re going to say to them in the meantime.’

Brian nodded reticently, nearly shivering at the kiss that Freddie planted on his tearstained cheek, watching helplessly as Freddie walked towards the door and opened it.

‘Stay strong, dear. You’ll find a way, and remember that I’ll be with you to help you when you tell them. You’re not alone in this,’ Freddie promised him before he disappeared around the door at the exact moment the bell rang, leaving Brian behind in the classroom that would soon be filled with math students, to be surrounded by thirty-two people and still feel so helplessly alone with his aching headache and stinging guilt complex.

# # #

Brian was doing everything on autopilot during the first few classes he had to teach – aimlessly welcoming a class, telling everybody to sit down and open their books on the right page, quickly starting the explanation of the homework they had been supposed to make (though most of them probably hadn’t done it), by that time often having to tell everybody to sit down and focus again before continuing his explanation again, much to his frustration. Normally spoken, he could handle their disinterest and mental absence to his lecture better, but in the nervousness of the moment, he had to try really hard not to snap at his students for not paying attention to him. He quickly finished his monologue about linear formulas, after which he simply told them to make their homework independedly, not caring if they chose to listen or if they rather started a conversation with the people sitting next to them or even at the other side of the classroom. Brian needed time to grade the last tests before his eleventh grade class would come wandering in, and even more than that, he needed time to think about a whole other topic than those bloody tests.

Needless to say, this was the prospect of standing face to face with Freddie, Roger and John and the rest of their class during the fourth hour of their timetable. Brian had no idea what to do or say to them, but one thing had to happen for sure: he had to find a reason to make the three best friends stay after class so he could confess what he had been doing behind their backs all along. How he was going to tell them the story was something he hadn’t had the courage to think about yet, given that his stomach turned at just the thought of being alone with the three of them. All he knew for now was that he had to find, or simply _create,_ maybe, a reason that would require them to stay after class. The only question was how he was going to tell them this.

The usual ‘I found some peculiarities your test-lie’? No, he had already used it the day before. Should he just ask them to stay? No, that would be ridiculous and might draw too much attention. Should he give them detention? For Freddie and Roger this could definitely work, since they never behaved for longer than fifteen minutes in a row. But how was he ever going to find a reason to give John, his sweetest, shyest, and certainly best behaving pupil, detention without drawing suspicion, scaring the living hell out of the boy ánd without breaking his own moral laws, as far as he still possessed those?

This dilemma kept him busy for the first three hours of teaching, and before he knew it, he had somehow managed to pass the ever-lasting hours already. He looked up in shock when the ring of the bell announced the beginning of the fourth hour according to their timetable. Soon after, the first pupils, all in groups of two or three of even more boys, walked into the classroom with a lot more noise and shouting than necessary, flopping down onto their chairs and tables and simply starting to chat with each other as if they didn’t have anything to do the entire fifty upcoming minutes. The thing was that Brian couldn’t bring himself to say something about it, or to even care about it – all he could think about was that he soon had to look at Roger’s cheeky smile and John’s sad eyes, both students completely unaware of the disastrous news he was soon going to share with them.

And there they were; first came in Freddie, who flashed him a flirty wink that made Brian’s heart flutter both out of adoration for the boy and out of nervousness, hoping fiercely nobody had seen the forbidden gesture. He was followed by Roger and John, the latter of which couldn’t even respond when his teacher greeted them, and instead simply clung onto Roger’s arm. The older boy gave him a reassuring look and guided him over to the front row, where they settled down next to Freddie.

‘Alright, class,’ Brian coughed as he straightened his tie and picked up the pile of tests he had finished last-minute, hoping not to let them slip through his fingers, which was a plausible scenario now that his hands were trembling so badly. ‘I’ve finished grading your tests, as promised, so I’m going to hand it out for you to see your grades. And after that, we’re going to… to… eh, to discuss the test,’ Brian hastily resumed the sentence that he had momentarily forgotten in his state of nervousness and despair. He tried not to blush as he paced through the class to deliver the right tests on the right desks, hearing the enthusiastic exclamations coming from people who had done well being interspersed with the disappointed or angered words the others uttered.

Swiftly, Brian dropped the B and the C+ Freddie and Roger had scored on their desks. He hardly dared to look at John when he gave him his usual A+, feeling a twinge of guilt stinging his stomach when the boy took the paper between his trembling fingers and started studying the erased red pencil that used to mark the ‘mistakes’ he didn’t know he had never made at all, which Brian had brought on only to erase them right after to make place for the A+ he had been deserving all along.

When he had handed out all the test papers, Brian walked over to the schoolboard and started to write the correct formulas out on the blackboard to discuss the answers with the class, pretending not to notice that at least half of them were not even _pretending_ to care about his commendation, and instead trying to focus on the few who did want to hear it. Unfortunately, this was starting to get harder and harder when silent whispers changed into people talking aloud and when pieces of paper being passed between tables traded places with crumpled balls being folded out of used pieces of square paper were thrown back and forth between students.

Brian intervened and ordered everybody to stop maltreating their maths notepads, which seemed to help for about a minute. But then the number one rebel of the class – needless to say that this was the one and only mister Roger Meddows Taylor – got the genial intuition that he could circumvent the newly coined classroom law of not being allowed to tear pages apart by simply ripping them out as a whole and mould them into semi-origami-like creations in the shape of air vehicles. Soon enough, actual paper planes were flying through the airspace of the classroom, and Brian groaned in annoyance and disbelief that one person could launch a chain reaction all within a matter of thirty seconds, and with this, destroying the remainder of the discipline the teacher had just managed to establish with a lot of effort. The discipline Brian needed so badly at the moment, given that it would be the only source of order in his life right now.

But just as he wanted to drop his crayon, turn around and simply call the whole class out for their disobedience, Brian realised that this was actually a perfect opportunity for him to divert his attention to the three people he needed to speak to that afternoon. He waited for the moment Freddie caught a paper vehicle between his fingers while Roger at the exact same moment turned around to throw one back at someone sitting behind them, and then the maths instructor turned around to the blackboard, slamming his fist down his desk top with a noise – and force, he would later find by the pain that started to spread through his hand – that managed to make everybody fall quiet all of the sudden and turn to look at their teacher.

‘Alright, that’s it!’ Brian shouted in a voice way louder than he thought he was capable of, surprising both himself and his pupils. But in order not to then be left with nothing to say or nothing to do in his moment of silence, he leapt forwards to tear the paper plane that Roger was still holding in his hand away from him and crumbling the not even badly designed draft to a ball of paper. After that, Brian reached out to bring the same destiny upon the paper plane of the student sitting next to Roger, the both looking at him in anticipation while the boy at the left side of Roger was practically trembling under Brian’s dark gaze. He just looked at the three of them for one more second, before he nodded his head slightly, tossing the unrecognisable paper planes in the trash bin next to his desk with a careless but miraculously well-coordinated movement of his hand. ‘Taylor and Bulsara, you’re staying after class for detention,’ Brian stated determinedly, and after having looked into John’s frightened eyes for a few way too long lasting seconds, he managed to add with just the same amount of fake yet fairly convincing rage in his voice: ‘And the same goes for you, Deacon.’

The whole class seemed to fall quiet the moment the word ‘detention’ in combination with the name of the quietest student fell from Brian’s lips, and everybody simply stared at the teacher, who tried his very best not to show his nervousness. Freddie seemed to be the first in line to probably sarcastically make a remark about the punishment, but just as he was about to open his mouth, a small smile started playing across his lips when his eyes met Brian’s. He probably understood that they weren’t actually going to have detention, but that Brian needed the three of them for a talk about recent events after class, like he had promised Freddie he would do that morning. When he did not reply, another short silence fell into the classroom for a second, before the first complaints came – unsurprisingly – from Roger. The thing that _did_ surprise Brian, even though it shouldn’t have done so, was that Roger didn’t start objecting for his own sake, but for John’s.

‘What? But John didn’t do anything! He didn’t do anything wrong, you can’t punish him!’ Roger said, pointing at his friend, who seemed to be on the edge of a nervous breakdown, probably fearing the worst for an after-class meeting. So far, Brian had only let him stay to make up for bad notes, and the thought of having to give him his body as a mean of punishment for being disobedient in class was all it took to drain all the remaining colour out of John’s face. Brian had to look away from his pale complexion in order not to give in and dismiss his youngest student; he had only just found the perfect solution for his dilemma, and he wasn’t going to give it up for the world.

‘You can see that I can,’ was all Brian replied as he turned his back on him to pick up his crayon again, much to Roger’s dismay.

‘Mister May, it was our fault. We threw those paper planes around the classroom, not him. John has nothing to do with it!’ Roger added, but Brian was having none of it.

‘Roger, quiet now. When something happens, it’s always the three of you,’ Brian found himself saying, and he was glad that he wasn’t facing them, because they all knew it was a lie. When something happened, it was always Freddie and Roger who were the culprits, while John tried to tell them to please not get themselves into troubles in between his attempts to oppress his giggles. Brian knew he was lying when he told them that John had been involved in the action as well, but he had been needing a reason to reproof them all day long, and he certainly wasn’t letting this chance slip by, no matter how illogical he must have been coming across to both the three friends and to the rest of the class, who luckily stayed out of the discussion and just listened and watched carefully. It wasn’t very often that a student – read: Roger – took the risk of arguing with a teacher, so when it happened, everybody was on full watch mode.

‘Don’t be unreasonable! It was me and not him! You know he didn’t do anything wrong!’ Roger was shouting now, and Brian knew he had to stay his ground, especially now that the battle was between him and his most daring student.

‘Don’t shout at me, will you?!’ Brian snapped at him as he turned around, which seemed to surprise Roger for an amount of time just long enough to calmly yet insistently add: ‘You three are coming to see me after class and that’s it. And now, I would like to go back to algebra, if you would allow me.’

‘No! Not before you dismiss John!’ Roger’s voice was close to a whine now, and it would have been funny another time, another place, when Brian hadn’t been so desperate to make all of them stay. He wished Roger could just see what he was trying to achieve, like Freddie did – and just as he was thinking about Freddie, the boy decided to help him out, thank God.

‘Rog, dear, let it go,’ Freddie hushed. ‘You’re only getting yourself into more troubles, love.’

‘I don’t fucking care!’ Roger turned to his friend. 'If mister May would have used his _eyes_ for once in his lifetime, he would have seen that John didn’t do anything-’

‘Quiet! One more word and I’m sending you to the headmaster,’ Brian threatened, and when Roger wanted to give him a probably rude reply, John tugged at his friend’s arm, begging him not to do so. Roger shot Brian one more angry glare that made Brian glad that looks couldn’t kill, because if they could, he wouldn’t have been among them anymore.

Reassured that Roger was quiet now, which was all one could wish for, Brian finished the formula he had been writing on the schoolboard. 'Good, back to assignment 2B, the binomial distribution,’ he sighed in relief, an emotion that was fuelled by the fact that the whole class zipped open pencil cases and flicked through maths books to find the chapter that matched their latest test without any complaints. Even Roger, who was supplied with pen and paper by John, had given in to his defeat and shifted closer to his friend, murmuring something in his ear that was probably either something rude towards their lecturer or something comforting to calm John down a little. Brian peered over his shoulder to see Freddie flash him a wink as he nodded his head towards the two friends who were now sitting even closer than before, and Brian winked back at him before resuming his work.

The remaining fifteen minutes of the class passed unexpectedly silently and smoothly, which was probably a result of Brian having told the shyest, smartest, and most of all best behaving pupil to stay after class – a destiny nobody wanted to follow. Brian kept a close eye on his three students on the front row, only to find Freddie doodling not just on his test paper but also in his maths book, while Roger had shifted so close to John that it surprised Brian that they were still sitting on their own chair.

When the bell rang, Brian dismissed the class with the words that he would see them again the week after and that they would then start with the new chapter, thus not assigning them any homework for the weekend. While the class left the room in a great temper, friendly greeting their teacher when they passed him by on their way to the door, all Brian could do was try to avoid Roger’s still intensely angry gaze by turning around and rather clumsily starting to wipe the blackboard with his back turned towards him.

‘Roger, are you coming? English is up next,’ Brian heard Freddie say, and he tightened his grip around the board eraser when the blond boy dismissed his plan of going to their next class right away.

‘Yes, I’ll be with you in a moment,’ he said, the distance in his voice making clear that he wanted to be alone with their teacher, who, at the moment, wanted nothing more than to simply disappear.

‘Roger, what are you… What are you going to do?’ John whispered at him, his glance resting between his friend and the maths teacher.

‘Nothing you have to worry about,’ Roger reassured him, and Brian didn’t miss the way Roger took advantage of the moment to place his hand on John’s, their fingers touching shortly, making the teacher’s heart flutter in guilt and adoration at the same time. Freddie escorted a half-sceptical, half-nervous looking John to the hallway, leaving Roger and Brian on their down in the classroom.

‘Mister may?’ Roger cleared his throat as he approached his teacher.

‘Yes, Roger?’ Brian asked as neutrally as possible, hoping that the boy wouldn’t start getting angry at him again, because no matter how hard he was going to make it for his teacher, Brian knew he had to hold onto his decision of sending him to detention. All _three_ of them, to be more specific, since he instantly knew that this was going to be about John having been given unjustified punishment.

‘I would like to apologise for my behaviour,’ Roger started, and it sounded so sincere for a change that it would have made Brian feel sorry for making the boys having to attend ‘detention’ – another time, another place, when there wasn’t so much at stake. ‘But please, don’t let John stay after class. He honestly didn’t do anything. You can let me stay all afternoon, send me to the principal, give me lines or whatever you like. But please, let him go.’ Roger was nearly pleading by now already, and Brian was having a really hard time not to break down and cry and just tell him already about his crimes against John. The power to oppress this tendency grew only weaker and weaker when Roger then added, so softly, voice so laced with concern that it made Brian realise once again that the student must really, really love his friend to a higher extend than just friendship: ‘I’m asking you this because John is very insecure. He is always afraid he’s doing things wrong, and this certainly won’t help his self-esteem. He doesn’t want to disappoint his family, and he’s really afraid they’ll get mad at him when they hear that he had to stay after class. Please, don’t do that to him-’

‘Roger, please stop,’ Brian sighed as he lowered the hand in which he was holding the board eraser and turned around. ‘I know John is… exactly everything you just said about him, but I really need a word with you three about your behaviour in class lately. If not for now, then for all the other times.’

‘Mister May-’ Roger raised his voice again, but Brian didn’t let him.

‘No, not ‘‘mister May.’’ I want you three in here after your last class and that’s it,’ Brian said, inwardly praising himself for his inflexibility. ‘Nobody has to know about it; I’ll write a note for his father to tell him that I wanted to speak to his son about his possible future career in-’

‘Mother. His father passed away a few years ago,’ Roger corrected him coldly, as if to make him feel especially guilty. He certainly succeeded in that, Brian had to admit – this was something he could add to the list of reasons why he never, _ever_ should have approached John in any illegitimate way.

‘I am so sorry Roger, I did not know,’ he answered softly. ‘How terrible, I am so sorry for him.’

‘Sure you are,’ Roger answered dryly. ‘But not enough to let him go for the violation of a rule that he didn’t even violate, apparently.’

Brian sighed. ‘Roger, please, stop it. Comfort him with the thought that he isn’t in troubles, okay?’

Roger let out a senseless snicker, raising his hands up in the air in helplessness and frustration. ‘This shit is getting more and more illogical! Why would you want to talk to him if he isn’t in troubles?’

‘That’s why,’ Brian answered curtly. ‘The three of you, four o’clock, my classroom, and that’s it.’

With a dissatisfied grunt, Roger turned his back to his teacher and paced out of the room, joining the other two boys who were waiting for him outside the classroom. Just before the door fell close behind Roger, Brian could see him wrap a protective arm around John’s lower back, and he sighed as he sank into his desk chair again, staring aimlessly at the thirty-two now empty seats in front of him while picking up the crayon he had slammed down on his desk earlier that hour.

 _Oh, John wasn_ _’t in troubles, and nor was Freddie, nor was even Roger,_ Brian thought as he mindlessly toyed with the white piece of chalk. _The only one that was in deep, deep troubles was Brian himself._


	3. Chapter 3

Tick. Tack. Tick Tack. Five minutes to four.

The deafening silence in the classroom was driving Brian out of his head. Normally, he would always find something to do while his class was making a test – reading a book, scribbling down song lyrics for songs he hoped he would be able to perform one day, checking homework assignments or other education-related activities. But right now, he couldn’t focus on _anything_ besides the fact that with every passing second, the moment of doom was nearing him with rapid speed. The moment of the clock would soon announce that this last hour of freedom for him and oblivion for his victims was over, only to be exchanged for the unpredictable catastrophes that telling his story to the remaining two schoolboys would bring along.

Tick. Tack. Tick. Tack. Three minutes to four.

The legs of a chair scratched over the wooden classroom floor, someone sniffled softly, a frustrated sigh was followed by the sound of pencil crossing off an answer that was regarded as incorrect by one of his students in the front row. Brian didn’t know if he had to be happy that these noises broke the eternal strain the notion of time was putting onto him, or if they only distracted him from the topic he had to focus on right now. Due to his awful headache and overall state of distraction, he hadn’t really managed to think about how exactly he was going to bring out the story in the most proper way possible in the situation he had gotten himself into. He wished he had an answer to his own desperation, he wished he knew a way to tell John and Roger what he had been doing to them without mentally breaking or aggravating them, but all he could do was listen to the sound of the clock and stare lifelessly at some random point in the distance while heavy seconds passed.

Tick. Tack. Tick. Tack. One minute to four. Brian wanted to _scream_.

He wanted to scream like he had never done before. He wanted to let all the frustration and anxiety out, he wanted to run away from the suddenly claustrophobically small classroom, he wanted to hide away from the three people he was going to have to face way too soon. But he was forced to stay in his seat and silently watch his pupils stressing out to finish the last assignments of their algebra test, both his students and he dreading the moment the bell would go off and announce that the last class of the day was over for completely different reasons.

The sound of the bell ringing through the classroom managed to startle both Brian and the class, though for the teacher, the ringing of the bell was even more of a jolt than for the others. He had to get himself together and make everybody leave as quickly as possible, because way too soon, his boyfriend and his two best friends would come walking in, expecting to be given detention for misbehaving, when in reality, the only one who had been misbehaving beyond words had been their teacher himself.

‘Alright people, that’s it for today. Please put down your pencil and leave your test paper and assignment paper on your desk,’ Brian said as he stood up from his desk, walking over to collect the papers, desperate to get everybody to leave the classroom as soon as possible. But when he moved towards the first student in line, he found that the boy wasn’t ready to turn in his paper yet.

‘Please, Mister, I haven’t finished yet!’ the student exclaimed nervously, and Brian sighed. Usually, he would have given the class a little more time when most of them hadn’t managed to fill in all the answers yet, but there was no time to do that now – not now that Freddie, Roger and John could be here any moment.

‘It’s okay Dante, I know,’ Brian addressed the brown-haired boy on the front row. ‘I’ll see what I can do – maybe I’ll just skip the last question of the test,’ Brian answered hastily as he went to reach out for the paper, but the boy clutched onto it.

‘Just a few more minutes,’ he said without looking up at his teacher, hastily scribbling down some more notes, as well as the rest of the class. ‘We started a little later as well.’

‘Well, we could have started on time if everybody would have been quiet right away,’ Brian remarked, then instantly regretted it when this unleashed an unwanted  series of reactions.

‘I was quiet! It’s not my fault that _some of us_ kept talking,’ the tenth grade pupil defended himself with a nod towards someone else, which was instantly reciprocated with an indignant reply from the person he had wordlessly mentioned. Unfortunately for Brian’s timetable, this was James, one of those people who could never simply let something slip by without having made a fuss about it first.

‘If you want to tell me something, you can just say it to my face, you sissy,’ James growled angrily.

‘ _What_ did you call me?’ Dante spat out as he turned around in his chair, and Brian groaned in frustration. All he had wanted by not giving the class extra time was for everybody to leave, but it turned out that this was taking even _more_ time, which he definitely couldn’t use right now.

‘Dante and James, be quiet! It doesn’t matter whose fault it is; the point is that your is up, so if everybody could please put down their pencil right now…’ Brian tried, sighing when nobody seemed to listen to him, as usual. What else had he expected? ‘ _Now_ , please. Otherwise I’ll have to give you and F,’ Brian warned, but not everybody seemed to take this admonition very seriously.

‘Sure you will,’ the first of the two students snickered, and Brian blushed slightly. Probably everybody present in the room knew that he would never have the heart to actually give someone and F for not turning in their test soon enough, but he was desperate to get everybody out right now, so he realised that this wasn’t exactly the right moment to give in to his defeat. He grabbed the paper away from Dante’s table before the student could even react, and paced back to his desk, where he picked up the first red coloured writing tool he could find.

‘You don’t believe me? Would you like to see me give a little demonstration?’ he asked as he took the pen lid off the red marker, which at last seemed to have an effect on both the two boys as well of on the rest of the class, who all, as if struck by magic, seemed to drop their pencil and put their tests aside, not wanting the same destiny to happen to them.

‘No, please! I’m sorry,’ Dante apologised hastily, and Brian put the marker down, his dark gaze travelling over the class that had fallen silent in anticipation and concern for their grades.

‘I thought so. Well, everybody stand up please and leave the room, then I will collect your tests. Have a good afternoon,’ he said as he negotiated his way through the crowd of displeased looking young people, ignoring the helpless comments that mainly consisted of, ‘But Mister May!’ and ‘This isn’t fair!’ and instead commenting with a simple, ‘It’ll be alright, I’ll see what I can do.’

Brian sighed in relief when the last frustrated students finally left the classroom, and he massaged his forehead with his fingertips. His headache had grown worse over the course of this last, way too long lasting hour, to the point where it was so intense that he could hardly think about anything besides the searing, throbbing pain. Unfortunately, this was just about the worst point in time in which he could possibly be bothered with a headache; he needed to _think_ , he needed to come up with a way to tell them the information they deserved to hear, and it needed to happen _right now_ because the boys would soon come walking through that door. Soon he would have to face all three of them again, and if he didn’t have a right way to share the story with them, this could become even more disastrous than if he would tell them without some kind of tactical approach.

But what could he possibly do? What could he possibly do besides trying to stay calm himself and trying to bring them the news carefully? And even when he did, would it really work at all? It wouldn’t change a single damn think about the fact that he had blackmailed and molested John, practically done the same to Roger, and cheated on Freddie. Would cautiously telling them the story, taking all the blame and bringing out the utter repentance he was feeling all the time, really change anything about the fact that he had committed multiple despicable crimes and moral misdemeanours against minors?

Only half a minute later, he was brought back to reality by footsteps in the hallway that neared his classroom, and he knew that his worst nightmare had arrived. It was time to face his victims and tell them the truth, the truth they all deserved to hear, even though he dreaded to tell them. He still did not know exactly what to say to them; even though he had thought about it all day long, he couldn’t come up with a right tactic to admit his sins to them. But for heaven’s sake, who could have? Who on earth could come up with a decent way to explain such indecent crimes to three young boys?

Strangely enough, no knock on the door followed to announce that they had arrived, no opening of the door happened, no sour greetings were exchanged between him and the students, since they didn’t come in at first. For a moment, Brian was afraid that he had only _envisioned_ the three students nearing his classroom, but when he moved over to the left to pick up another test paper, he could distinguish three boys in uniform through the thin ridge of glass next to the door, unmistakably the three friends. Brian soon found out what exactly the reason for their reticence was when one of them moved his hand up to grab the door handle, but was prevented from doing so by another.

‘No, please, not yet! I really don’t want to go in there,’ Brian could hear somebody squeak, and once he recognised the voice to be John’s, he covered his face with his hands. _Of course_ he didn’t dare to get in here after class. _Of course_ he didn’t dare to go to the place where he had been raped many, many times. _Of course_ he didn’t want to enter the space where so much fear and powerlessness and bad memories lingered. Just hearing John’s words that were laced with fear made Brian want to turn himself in, if one of the students wasn’t going to do so already.

‘It’s going to be fine, dear. We’re here with you.’ Freddie’s soft voice flowed like silk, but it naturally wasn’t enough to convince John that there was nothing to worry about.

‘But you don’t understand!’ John brought in. ‘I’ve never had detention before, and I… I wasn’t really expecting to be given detention either.’

‘There has to be a first time for everything, right?’ Roger joked, but John didn’t seem to find this very funny in his state of distress. ‘Deaky, it’s going to be fine. He’ll probably want to hear us say that we’re sorry about disturbing his explanation and then he’ll let us go, easy as that. Believe me, that’s all he ever does when he tells me to stay after class,’ Brian could hear Roger lie, and it made him fill with the opposite feelings of disgust towards himself and admiration for Roger for trying to comfort John. ‘And on top of that, we all know that you didn’t do anything wrong. I promise we will take all the blame, won’t we, Freddie?’ Roger asked his company, who nodded determinedly.

‘But Mister May seemed really mad at us!’ John reminded them, and even Brian could hear that he was close to tears. He wished he could simply run up to them and tell them how sorry he was, how fucking _sorry_ he was, but he knew he could never make a coherent story if he was to now go after them. He would probably burst out in tears at just the sight of the three schoolboys, two of whom didn’t have any idea what had been going on all along, one of whom was probably going to break down in tears once he found out whilst the other would probably beat him up if he got the chance.

Brian kind of hoped that he would.

At the moment, though, Roger seemed to show his softer side. ‘Deaky, you’re trembling!’ Roger stated, and Brian could feel his heart both break and melt at the same time when the blond boy leant in to hug his friend. ‘Poor thing, there’s no need to be so afraid! It’s going to be over before you know it,’ Roger tried to console him while continuously rubbing his back, and though it was so cute to see him taking care of John like that, Brian felt his stomach turn the moment he spoke these words. Those were the exact same words he always used to calm John down with right before he would move on to do the most despicable things to his body and soul, the most atrocious deeds he soon would have to confess to all three of them.

Slowly detaching himself from John’s body again after a hug that had lasted way too long to simply be purely amicable, Roger put both hands on his friend’s shoulders. ‘Be strong, John. It will soon be all over. We’ll have to go now – we all know that Mister May doesn’t appreciate latecomers. Alright?’ he asked, and John nodded gloomily.

‘Mister May?’ Freddie called out as he knocked on the door a few times in a row. It sounded so weird to hear Freddie call him anything else besides his first name or another nickname he had for him, and suddenly it hit Brian that Freddie should _never_ have been in any position to not call him by his teacher title. He never should have become more than, and yet he had. Freddie had crossed the thin line between student-teacher and partners long ago – no, Brian had _let_ him cross that dangerous line long ago without any forms of resistance or serious concerns. He had _allowed_ him to become his friend, his love interest, his partner, his soulmate, and whatever more terms to describe Freddie with in words that were forbidden to be used to describe a teacher-student relationship with. It was inappropriate, it was scandalous, it was prohibited to be this close to one of his pupils, and yet Brian couldn’t let go of him for the world, simply because Freddie had grown to be his world.

But there was no time to think about that now, not now that he had to focus on how to tell John and Roger what he had done to them all while being in a relationship with their best friend. Brian took in one more gulp of air before he allowed them in.

‘Come one in,’ he managed only slightly shakily as he ordered himself to go back to his task of picking the papers up from the desk to give himself something to do when the door opened softly to reveal his students. As expected, it was Freddie who first came walking in (and who, even now, didn’t let he chance of flashing him a wink slip by), followed by Roger, who softly pushed John over the treshold as well. ‘Boys, I’m glad that you’re here. Do take a seat, I’ll be with you in a moment,’ Brian said while trying to flash a smile at them, trying his best to make John feel as comfortable as he could possibly be in this kind of situation. But his youngest pupil didn’t even dare to look up at him; all he could do was let his friends take him into the classroom and guide him over to the three tables and chairs in the front row, the place where they always sat during class.

‘Of course, take your time. It’s not like we have anything else to do this afternoon apart from waiting for you to admonish us for molesting our maths books,’ Roger said sarcastically, and Brian sighed, swiftly moving on to another row of detached tables to collect sheets of paper. He would later move the desks and chairs back to their initial setting again, he decided – he shouldn’t leave John in such agony for longer than absolutely necessary. He could see the boy’s hunched shoulders from the corners of his eyes, and he started to feel worse and worse about himself with every passing second.

‘You can take my chair, Deaky. You can sit in the middle,’ Roger offered as he pulled out his chair for him, all of them knowing that this was to let John feel the maximum protection of sitting in between the two people who would always stick up for him, regardless of the situation. It was cute that Roger wanted to protect him like this, Brian though dimly, but he feared the worse for himself when Freddie and Roger took place on either side of John – on top of the table, of course, being the rebels that they were. John would never have the courage to sit down on anything that wasn’t seating furniture, whereas Freddie and mainly Roger didn’t seem to think of it as weird or inappropriate to simply toss their bags aside and plump down on top of their desks. _John and Roger formed such a huge contrast,_ Brian thought, _but God, they could be so good together._

This thought was confirmed once again when Roger dropped his passive-aggressive body language towards his teacher to exchange it with another reassurance for his best friend. ‘It’s alright. Remember that you’re not in troubles. He just wants to have a chat with us,’ Roger whispered at his friend, who was nervously chewing on the inside of his cheek, hands folded in his lap, not daring to say or do anything. Brian looked up to find Freddie giving him a satisfied smile and a short nod that announced that it was time to stop playing around and come over to tell them the story.

‘So, Mister May,’ Roger started as he crossed his arms over his chest. ‘The paper plane incident and a miscalculation from your side regarding who was involved in it, because I think we both know bloody well that John would _never_ engage in such things.’

‘I know,’ Brian admitted as he walked over to the front of the class again, dropping the pile of test sheets on his desk rather sloppily – certainly when compared to all the effort he had done the last couple of days to correct and rearrange stacks of paper – and pulled out his chair to move it over the front of his desk. He’d rather stay behind it, to put some kind of barrier around himself, since he sure as hell had no idea how the boys were going to react to the story. But he reminded himself that he didn’t have any right to protect himself in any possible way right now; he needed to let down his walls and present himself to them with the same vulnerability and fragility they had shown him. Placing his chair in front of the desk and sitting down just a mere metre away from them, he continued his story. ‘I know that wasn’t like you to do, John, and I know you therefore also never did it,’ he addressed his youngest pupil, but whereas Roger and Freddie looked him in the eyes, John couldn’t even manage to stop staring at his trembling hands that were lying in his lap.

‘Then why did you give him detention anyway?’ Roger asked in a growl – he sounded very annoyed by the fact that his best friend had been pulled through such fear for no particular reason at all, which Brian understood very well. Just looking at John in his state of fright and insecurity would make everyone reconsider even the slightest possible things they could have done or said to him that might have upset him like this; for Brian, unfortunately, there was so much to reconsider that he hardly had the courage to even start doing so.

‘Because I needed a reason to have the three of you come over here after class. So John, I’m sorry if I worried you, but please know that you haven’t done anything wrong,’ Brian soothed. _I, on the contrary, have done wrong **anything** one possibly could have done wrong, _ he added in his mind, but he didn’t have the courage to start the confessions yet. He needed to find a right moment – that was, a moment as peaceful as it could possibly get in the situation, only to destroy this highly valued tranquillity right after.

John did look up now for a moment, nodding shortly as he sniffled softly, before bowing his head down again. He still looked fairly uncomfortable and fragile – and who could blame him? Who could possibly blame him, knowing that being with his maths teacher usually equalled being bent over a desk and practically being forced to give your permission to be sexually molested if you wanted to pass your class?

‘See? I told you it would be fine,’ Freddie told him with a smile that was well-meant, but that did not look very sincere. Brian knew right away that this was because things weren’t fine _at all_ ; the real story had yet to come.

Luckily, it was Roger who managed to grant John a little more comfort by putting a more than simply amicable hand on his shoulder. ‘And what did you need us for, then?’ Roger continued to ask, not deviating from his goal of hunting down the reason why Brian had pulled John through such stress if he had known all along that John hadn’t been misbehaving for even a second.

‘Because… I needed to have a word with you three,’ Brian answered remarkably calmly. ‘And mainly with the two of you, to be honest,’ he added, nodding shortly at John and Roger, the first one of which held his breath once again, while the latter didn’t look too impressed, as usual.

‘And what about Freddie? Why is he here?’ Roger continued to ask without skipping a beat, and Brian stared at his secret boyfriend for a moment, not sure what he had to say to this question. What was he going to say without immediately giving away what he needed to say in the much more delicate way that the situation demanded and deserved? _Because you three are always together, so I figured I should invite all three of you? Because he also misbehaved in class and it’d be too unfair if I let him go but gave John detention? Because he was secretly my boyfriend all along while I shagged one of you with questionable consent and raped the other?_

‘Because…’ Brian started awkwardly, rolling the tip of his dark blue tie between his thumb- and forefinger, still not having figured out what to say. _Damnit_ , he thought to himself. _If I’m already starting to blush right now, what am I going to do when this conversation advances?_ ‘Because, you know, he’s your… he’s your friend, and you three are always together-’ Brian stuttered, but luckily, he was saved by Freddie, as usual.

‘Moral support, dears,’ Freddie joked casually with a playful wink, but as he turned to look at Brian, the teacher could see in his eyes that it took a lot of effort for Freddie to keep up appearances for as long as necessary, and Brian realised that he had to move on and release his boyfriend from the strain he was currently putting on him.

‘Exactly. Moral support, but without the wink. I think you are going to need his support, because I…’ Brian started, having to clear his throat before he could finish his sentence. ‘I have something I need to tell you two.’

John seemed to feel addressed by hearing these words, but not even to Brian’s surprise, it wasn’t his teacher who he looked at, but Roger. The blond boy gave him a short, nervous look that Brian found understandable, but very much out of place and ill-fitting for a confident troublemaker like Roger, before turning to fix those light blue eyes on his teacher, making Brian wonder how he was ever going to be able to look into those eyes as he confessed his sinful actions to him.

‘What do you have to tell us?’ Roger asked on behalf of both of them, but Brian couldn’t bring himself to answer him yet; all he saw was the images of his students during the awful after-class moments flickering before his eyes as he lifelessly stared at the ground. He felt like he was going to be dizzy – more than that, he feel like he was going to be _sick_. But knowing that he could not show this to his pupils, certainly not in this situation, so he oppressed the sudden – everlasting, really, to be honest – urge to vomit. ‘Mister May? What do you want to tell us?’ Roger repeated, bringing Brian back to reality and making him glad that Roger didn’t seem to notice his physical and mental state of being. ‘Something wrong with our notes? Suspect troubles at home? Troubles between John and me, even?’ Roger asked, and only the last option he mentioned actually seemed to worry him. It could have been expected, given that it would be a plausible scenario for Brian to haul two arguing friends into his classroom to make them talk it over, yet it would be unthinkable for Roger to fight with his best friend and secret crush.

‘No, no no, nothing like that,’ Brian interrupted his enumeration hastily, rubbing over his painful forehead.  ‘Though maybe, the grades do have something to do with it… Well, they didn’t originally, but I… There’s nothing wrong with your skills in maths, it’s just…’ he started messily, finding both Roger and John staring at him a little dazedly, and he looked at Freddie as if to find strength in the boy’s calm face, since he sure as hell was starting to grow crimson red from nervousness and tension.

‘Mister May, please stay calm,’ Freddie told him softly. In his voice, Brian could hear the love and calmness he usually spoke with to him when they were alone, but at the same time the detachment he was supposed to address him with in the presence of others; a detachment Brian realised they should have stuck to in their position of teacher and student. But given that they had crossed this line long, long ago, Brian had gotten used to the thin line between treating each other as lovers and treating each other as person of authority and high school pupil. It was just strange to hear him speak this way when they were about to talk about such a serious topic. ‘Take in a deep breath and tell them what you want to tell them.’

‘Okay,’ Brian coughed after having done as his partner told him. ‘Okay then. There is something I have to confess to the two of you… Starting with you, John,’ he said. It seemed like the best idea to start with John, being the first person he had started to blackmail and molest, after which the situation had only escalated and eventually moved onto Roger, the other victim. But first, it was time to relief John from the tension that having been called into the classroom without knowing why, only to burden him with confessions way worse than this kind of stress. But Freddie was right; he deserved the truth just as much as the rest of them did.

‘John,’ Brian started softly, looking up to meet the unexpecting victim’s eyes, before they both looked away. They could all feel the tension lingering in the air around them; it was too painful to face each other already, even though John didn’t seem to feel what was going to come. But then, realising that he had to stay his ground and be strong, Brian forced himself to keep looking at him, even when the younger boy didn’t have the courage to do the same. ‘John, remember you recently scored a series of fail marks for your test?’ John nodded, and Brian realised that it had been a stupid question –someone as focussed and as serious as John would never forget about his grades, so he quickly added the first confession that was going to lead to a series of confessions that were way worse than just this. ‘You never really did.’

For the first time of the day, John looked straight at him and even managed to keep doing so as he asked him a very understandable question. ‘What… what do you mean?’ he asked him quietly, not daring to raise his voice to a teacher, and certainly not to this one.

‘You never scored any fail marks. You scored straight A’s, just like usual, but I… I manipulated your grades,’ Brian said with a shameful sigh, knowing that once he had confessed this, there was no way back. From now off, it was only going to go downwards; John would be hurt and shocked, Roger would demand an explanation, and with Freddie sitting right next to them, there was no use lying about the reason why Brian had modified the notes.

John was staring intently at him, his grey-greenish eyes dazed and sharp at the same time, as far as this was a possible combination, but he didn’t speak this time. He probably didn’t know what to say to this unexpected story of his teacher’s; he opened his mouth, only to close it right after. Fortunately for John but unfortunately for Brian, it was Roger who took it from there.

‘You did _what_?!’ Roger spat out as he leant forwards to Brian, his facial expression consisting of solely anger and disbelief. ‘You manipulated his grades? Are you insane?!’ he said, involuntarily making Brian back off into his office chair. ‘Have you got any idea how insecure you’ve made him by doing so? He’s been up till midnight for days in a row to prepare for your stupid tests,’ he told him, all of which only made Brian  even guiltier, ‘all while you manipulated his fucking notes!’

‘Please! Let me explain,’ Brian quickly said to soothe the atmosphere, even though he knew it was only a temporary solution; the reason behind the lowered notes was way worse than the act itself. It worried him that Roger was already this angry about the notes; Brian could not possibly predict how he was going to react to the confession of the rape of John, but he guessed he was going to find out about that all too soon. ‘I… did this for a reason.’

‘And this reason was?’ Roger questioned without a beat. ‘I can’t think of a valid reason to systematically lower someone’s grades.’ Brian swallowed painfully, deciding to ignore the second sentence and try to start explaining the ‘reason’ mentioned in Roger’s first question.

‘John, do you… You recall the times I made you stay after class, don’t you?’ Brian addressed John quietly, knowing that speaking to him in this way was the only thing he could possibly do right now to support him in this moment that would soon be filled with sinful confessions and candid but useless apologies. John seemed to feel what was coming; right after Brian had dropped the rhetorical question into the momentarily stillness of the classroom, he completely tensed up, his face his eyes grew soft with the kind of vulnerability and helpless grief one would expect to find in someone after  they had been told that a loved one has passed away. To the quiet and insecure John, though, the kind of heartache he was going through now that he seemed to realise that his teacher was going to do a public confession and successive apology, probably bordered this kind of pain and helplessness.

‘Please don’t,’ John managed breathlessly, but he could probably tell that Brian wasn’t going to stop his monologue, which made him emit a shivery sigh of helplessness, the first tears welling up behind his eyes. It made Brian feel so, _so_ horrible to see him like this; he revived the experience of all those times he had looked into John’s fearful eyes while his student was lying underneath him, but this time it was as if all these rape sessions came together and morally assaulted him all at once, like they usually only did when he was contemplating all the awful life decisions he had made, lying in bed at night in the darkness of his room and of his soul.

‘I have to, John, I’m so sorry. You remember them, don’t you? The times we were supposed to talk about what went wrong with your tests?’ Brian continued in an attempt to block out the perception of seeing John on the edge of a nervous breakdown before he had even shared the story he was supposed to tell, but for this one time, John didn’t let him get away with this as easily as he normally would have done.

‘Please,’ John whispered, hardly audibly, tears starting to shimmer in his grey-greenish eyes.

‘John? Deaky, are you okay?’ Roger interfered, his concerned glance resting between John and their teacher, but he remained unable to make up what was going on when none of them answered him.

‘But we didn’t,’ Brian added to his own story, feeling awful for ignoring his victim’s pleads, but he knew he didn’t really have another choice after his promise to Freddie. ‘We never talked about what you should do to better your test results. Not mathematically, at least,’ Brian added softly, looking down at his nails on which he had involuntarily started to peel, just to give his shaking fingers something to do. ‘Because I simply upgraded them if you… agreed to my offer.’

‘Not… Not now, Mister May. _Please_ , not with them around,’ John implored as he nervously glanced around at the two boys sitting on either side of him, not knowing that one of them already knew perfectly well what was coming.

‘What’s wrong? Is there something I don’t know?’ Roger repeated, now more insistently, using the hand he had put on John’s shoulders minutes before to shake his shoulder in an useless attempt to catch his attention, but all John could do was stare at Brian, desperately stare at him even though he must have known all along that there was no way back now that Brian had started asking him these questions about their secretive after-class meetings.

‘Yes, there is something you don’t know, and that’s why we’re here today. Because I… have to admit some horrible things I’ve done. Because those offers meant that he would keep his C or D or even worse, unless he… gave me access to his body.’ When all of them, but mainly Roger, stared at him in disbelief, Brian continued: ‘If he let me… touch him, undress him, feel him, and… have sex with him. Not, that isn’t the right word,’ he corrected himself again. ‘If he would let me… enter him. I forced myself onto him. In other words, I… molested John. I sexually abused him. I… I raped you, John, and I’m so, so fucking sorry.’

Much to Brian’s surprise, Roger stayed calm at first, simply looking at him sceptically while blinking a little confusedly with those big, blue eyes. It seemed like the concept of a teacher having raped Roger’s best friend and crush was too much to take in for Roger, who therefore had lapsed into disbelief instead of anger, though Brian was sure this second emotion would soon follow when the idea of John having been sexually molested would sink in.

‘You didn’t. You can’t have… you can’t have done that to him,’ Roger eventually managed to wrongly conclude, the wry smile of disbelief that had formed on the corners of his lips starting to fade.

‘I really wish I hadn’t, but I have,’ Brian answered, not even avoiding Roger’s intensely blue eyes.

‘You can’t possibly… can’t he, Deaky?’ Roger asked as he turned to his friend again. ‘John?’ he asked a little louder, sterner, and most of all, sounding more and more concerned when a response held off. ‘John, tell me he’s lying. Tell me it’s all fake.’

‘He’s not… he’s not lying. It’s true,’ John squeaked, before his voice drowned in teardrops, quiet but helpless sobs taking over his body. Whereas Freddie immediately threw both arms around the visibly trembling schoolboy, Roger didn’t seem to be able to do anything but stare at his best friend for a few seconds, looking at him with the emptiest eyes Brian had ever seen; the emptiest eyes that still displayed the millions of thoughts that must have been going through his mind. It was as if all of Roger’s strength, both mentally and physically, was being drained out of him the moment he heard the confession, and made place for numbness, helplessness, _disbelief_. Disbelief that a scenario as dreadful as this could have happened to John, out of all possible people. Disbelief that anyone was capable of hurting someone as pure and kind and innocent as the fifteen year old straight-A-student. Disbelief that the offender who had committed these crimes, was someone as familiar as their maths teacher, someone he trusted to never engage in such illegal practices, especially not to John.

The hand that had previously been resting at John’s shoulder slipped off its initial place, and Brian soon found out why this was happening; Roger jumped off his table immediately after releasing his hand of its previous position and task, and in a matter of an eye blink, he had moved over to him, grabbing the collar of his teacher’s blamelessly white dress shirt with one hand, the other one curled up into a first and ready to attack. Brian didn’t even get the time to back off or protect himself, and nor he wanted to do so; finally, _finally_ after all this time, he was about to get what he deserved. The only bad thing was probably that John let out a shriek of surprise and fright when Roger’s fist collided with his enemy’s right eye with a sickening sound. John couldn’t have seen the event, given that he was still burying his face in his hands, but just the sound of bones to skin was all anyone would need to hear to conclude what had just happened.

‘You fucking asshole! How dare you fucking touch him? Goddamnit, I could _kill_ you for just thinking about hurting him!’ Roger spat out loudly; Brian figured that making sure no one heard their secret conversation wasn’t exactly Roger’s number one priority now that he wanted revenge on the rapist of his best friend. Brian was hardly surprised when Roger brought up his hand a second time; he just felt bad for John that the boy had just gathered enough strength to look up at them, since this meant that he had to witness the bloodbath that was his nose the moment right after it had made contact with the power behind Roger’s angry fist. The sharp sting of pain made stars appear before Brian’s eyes, but this was nowhere near his priorities when he heard John crying in the background.

‘Roger!’ John managed in between his sobs, ‘Roger, please, do-don’t get yourself in… in troubles!’ he wept, which Brian found to be so very him; it was typically John to worry about his best friend getting himself into troublesome situations while defending him.

‘If beating up your rapist means getting in troubles, I couldn’t care less! Fuck it, if he really raped you, I’ll… I’ll…’ Roger choked out, in his state of anger not even managing to make optimal use of his voice anymore, and he unsurprisingly chose to let the aggression out through another blow of his fist against Brian’s already bleeding nose.

This last slap seemed to be what Freddie needed to see to jump into action, literally, by letting go of John, jumping off the table and stepping over to his partner and whose capturer. ‘No, don’t do that! Don’t hurt him!’ Freddie ordered all of a sudden as he tried to catch Roger’s arm.

‘Are you _insane_?! Haven’t you heard what he’s done to John? How could anyone not want to hurt this goddamned rapist!’ Roger shouted as he lashed out at Brian’s face again, but he missed his target when Freddie caught his arm in a strong grip of his hand and pulled him aside. When Freddie did so, Brian could see blood dripping off Roger’s knuckles, and it was no miracle to anyone that this was most likely to originate from the bleeding nose Roger had caused him.

‘What the fuck are you doing? Let me go!’ Roger yelled, but Freddie did quite the opposite; he tugged him aside and pushed the struggling boy away from Brian and against the wall. Though Freddie was slightly shorter and slimmer than Roger, his movements were certainly more on point than Roger’s wild and uncontrollable attempts to free himself and rushing over to his rival again, which resulted in Freddie being able to rather easily pinning Roger down to the wall behind him. Brian’s eyes helplessly followed them, not able to say or do anything whilst catching his breath through parted lips, over which a stream of blood from his bleeding nose streamed down and dripped onto the crinkly collar of his shirt. Not that he minded, though; he hardly felt the stream of blood ticking down his face as he watched Freddie pushing Roger’s wrists up against the wall to make sure he couldn’t hit him either, given that Roger probably viewed him as a traitor for sticking up for their maths teacher.

‘Goddamnit, I told you to let me go!’

‘No,’ Freddie breathed in response, tightening his grip around Roger’s struggling wrists when his friend writhed around to free himself from his unexpected intervention and even more unexpected strong hold of his friend. ‘Not before you promise you won’t hit him again.’

‘This is ridiculous! He blackmailed John, he raped him, he- why on earth are you protecting him? You should be on _our_ side, for fuck’s sake!’ Roger yelled, just one look at John, who was now sitting all alone at his desk with his tearstained face covered with his hands, being enough to refuel the hate towards his teacher that hadn’t even vanished the slightest yet. ‘I asked you something! Why are you protecting him, you moron?!’

Freddie tightened his grip on Roger’s arm when the blond boy aggressively tried to move away from him, ignoring the insult and taking in a deep breath before he spoke the words that Brian knew could get both of them – and mainly himself, of course – into even more troubles .

‘Because he’s my boyfriend.’

Silence filled the classroom when those words left Freddie’s lips. Nobody dared to speak or move or even breathe; even John’s sobbing momentarily came to an end upon hearing those words. Brian awaited the reaction of the others with his heart pounding in his chest. The shock seemed to have managed to silence John, and even Roger stopped trying to break away for a few seconds.

‘Say that again,’ Roger ordered huskily, as if he couldn’t believe what he had just heard and needed for Freddie to repeat it, even though he probably dreaded to hear those words again.

‘He’s my boyfriend. That’s why I don’t want you to hurt him,’ Freddie repeated in the same serious voice, hands ever-tightly clinging around Roger’s limbs.

A breathy chuckle escaped Roger, and he smiled wickedly at his capturer. ‘Very funny, Fred, but this isn’t exactly the moment for _jokes_ ,’ he said, voice sharpening when the end of the sentence neared.

‘It’s not,’ Freddie told him sternly, shaking his head lightly to give his words the credibility they desperately needed. ‘It’s not a joke. We’ve been together for… six months or so?’ Freddie guessed as turned to look at Brian, whose breath hitched in his throat at just the sight of his gleaming eyes.

‘Almost seven,’ Brian responded instantly but huskily, feeling as if someone or something was choking him. He looked down, and upon concluding that Roger hadn’t managed to somehow break away from Freddie’s iron grip and wrap his hands around his throat, he figured it must have been his own nerves that were constricting him.

‘Oh, my God… Oh my God, oh my God, oh my _GOD_!’ Roger emitted a series of questionable profanities, regarding the dishonourable way he spat out the words, the last remaining traces of empathy towards Freddie disappearing instantly. ‘What the fuck is _wrong_ with you?! Both of you, for crying out loud! Have you gone out of your fucking minds?! You were dating him while he molested John?’ Roger cried out in total disbelief.

‘I didn’t know he was doing this! I only found out yesterday!’ Freddie protected himself, not realising that this only made matters worse.

‘And you’re still with him now? Fuck me, that’s pathetic! He cheated on you, he shagged me behind your back, he raped John!’

‘He… did what to you?’ John’s soft voice suddenly interrupted the whole scene going on in front of him, and they all stopped for a second, realising that just as Roger hadn’t known about the assault of John, John hadn’t been aware of the meetings between his teacher and his best friend. It was as if all of them waited a second, wordlessly asking each other to explain the rest of the situation to him.

‘Oh goodness, John…’ Roger spoke with a softness that Brian had been afraid he had lost for evermore after finding out about these sex crimes. ‘No, of course you couldn’t know that Mister May isn’t just a rapist, but also just an overall pervert. While apparently being in a relationship with Freddie, which is just as new to me as it must be to you, he shagged me after school in exchange of not sending me to the principal. That’s the person you’re dating, Freddie,’ he said as he turned to his capturer, whose grip on his wrists tightened while at the same time, his intense glare seemed to trade places with a softer look and a tremble of his lips. ‘A rapist, a pervert, a fucking criminal. He’s our fucking _teacher_! I could make up another dozen of reasons why this is just _sick_! Are you retarded? What the hell is _wrong_ with you?!’ he snapped at Freddie, who bit down his bottom lip as he struggled to come with both an answer to Roger’s series of questions and a way to keep himself from starting to cry.

John, probably sensing the painful dilemma Freddie had gotten into, stuck up for the oldest boy. ‘Roger, please… Don’t say things you-you’re gonna regret later,’ John sniffled, making Roger turn around to look at his miserable friend.

‘Don’t worry, I won’t,’ Roger confided, before he focussed on Freddie again, glaring at his mentally broken maths teacher from the corners of his angry eyes. ‘Because honestly, there is nothing I could possibly regret saying to a rapist and his condoning boyfriend,’ he said leisurely, but he spat out the last words as if they had a bad taste to them in his mouth.

‘I’m _not_ condoning this,’ Freddie whispered in response, blinking fast to fight the tears that threatened to form in his eyes, to no avail. ‘Not at all. _Never_ think that I-’

‘What has he done to you?’ Roger simply interrupted him while frowning quasi-thoughtfully at him, an awfully vindictive leer staring to form on his face, apparently very much enjoying the sight of Freddie losing his usually confident attitude and exchanging it for eyes filled with tears. ‘Did he _brainwash_ you into believing that it’s okay to sexually abuse minors? Your friends, not to mention? John, not to mention! How fucking _sick_ are you to downplay that piece of shit raping John?!’

‘That’s enough!’ Freddie cried, tears dripping down his cheeks by now, forcing Roger against the wall again, this time by giving him a hard push against both shoulders. ‘I don’t agree with _anything_ he’s done! He never should have touched you or John in any way, or cheat on me, or… Fuck, I know that everything he’s done is all so damn wrong, and I’m furious at him for it!’

‘Then why don’t you fucking leave him, like you should have done right away?! This is illegal, for fuck’s sake! And have you got any idea what you’re doing to John by staying with this abusive rapist?’ Roger shouted, which confirmed that John was once again all that was on his mind.

‘Because I can’t! Because I… I do still love him,’ Freddie managed, before he broke down in tears, his iron fingers slipping off Roger’s shoulders. In his state of grief, he simply couldn’t keep his shaking hands on Roger’s shoulders. And besides, Freddie needed them to wipe away the waterfall of tears that started dripping down his face, just like the blood was dripping off Brian’s nose, lips and chin, and the boy finally allowing himself to sob his heart out. It broke Brian’s heart to see him like that, knowing that he was the sole reason why Freddie was being treated like this by one of his best friends. But it was as if he was paralyzed, perplexed, glued to his chair; in the explosion of emotions - hate, grief, disbelief, anger, contempt, and even worse – they had tumbled into since the start of this conversation, he couldn’t seem to move, let alone get up and walk over to his boyfriend to comfort him. All he seemed to be able to do was wish that he could do so while looking at all three boys in compassion for three completely different but completely valid reasons.

‘I’m going to throw up,’ Roger eventually growled to no one in general. ‘This is the most sickening thing I’ve _ever_ … Come on, John, let’s get out of here,’ Roger proposed as he walked away from his spot against the wall, not oppressing the urge to bump into Freddie’s shoulder when he passed the crying boy. He walked around John’s desk, pulling John out of his chair and insistently yet carefully tugging the student along with him, which the latter didn’t let happen without any forms of protest.

‘No! No, we can’t leave Freddie behind!’ John gasped as he looked at Freddie, who was now openly crying, clumsily wiping the endless streams of mascara-stained tears away with his hands.

‘Watch me,’ Roger replied curtly, but John didn’t take no for an answer that easily.

‘Roger! He’s our friend, you- you have to help him!’ John squeaked, but he was soon cut off by his protective best friend.

‘He’s not our friend!’ Roger was raising his voice at his crush too, now. It made John wince and take a step back from him, which probably made Roger realise that he had to treat John more carefully despite his boiling rage, for he continued a little softer. ‘He’s not our _‘friend’_ , John. _Not_ when he protects your rapist!’

‘I’m not! Roger, _please_ , I’m not! You know I condemn this just as much as you do!’ Freddie sobbed, but Roger simply pushed him aside as if he was some kind of object standing in the way when he made his way to the door, John involuntarily trailing along behind him.

‘You’re a fucking _liar_. If you really would have condemned his actions, you would have left him! You’re not our friend when you choose your rapist boyfriend over us!’ Roger brought in against Freddie, and Brian swallowed painfully to clear his throat, deciding that it was time for him to intervene, not to stay that he should have done this way before. Freddie was protecting him by staying with him, and all he was doing was sitting around and lifelessly watching as his boyfriend was getting yelled at. What kind of lover was he to him, now that he wasn’t even standing up for him while Freddie was still on his side after all he’d done to him? How could he possibly not help his boyfriend out now that Roger was shouting all kinds of reproaches at him?

Feeling ashamed of himself more than ever, Brian gathered all his confidence and prayed for the best. ‘Roger,’ he spoke as he shakily got out of his chair, hoping the student wouldn’t notice how nervous and mentally instable he was. ‘Please stay here, because we have to talk. Freddie really didn’t know that I-’

‘Would you mind keeping your fucking mouth _shut_?’ Roger verbally lashed out at him by just hearing the sound of his voice, ‘or should I come over to shut it for you?’ he snapped, and before Brian could even open his mouth again, Roger continued his hateful monologue. ‘I don’t listen to criminals like you. I’m taking John with me and I’ll see you in court. Because if you think I’m going to let you get away with raping a minor, you’re fucking _mistaken_.’

Brian’s eyes fell close when Roger mentioned the statement he had been afraid to hear all day long. He was going to turn him in, let him be arrested, sue him, and just in this one sentence he sounded so damn confident about it that Brian didn’t even dare to try and talk him around, try to make him drop the plan. Maybe it was even more important that he knew that he didn’t have any right to even try so; as Freddie had told him before, Roger had every right to turn him in and let him be put behind bars for a period long enough to never be able to return to teaching again, to never form a threat to any other innocent schoolboy again. And though the thought of being arrested, questioned, sued and then undoubtedly being imprisoned scared the hell out of him, the more he thought about it, the more he realised that it was probably safest for all of them if he would be locked away for evermore.

Therefore, Brian didn’t even make an attempt to try and change his mind; he tried to come up with something to calm him down instead, but he didn’t even have the time to do so, because somebody else already spoke up to change Roger’s mind.  He didn’t know if it surprised him when he found this to be _John, out of all possible people_. Of course, he had expected that John would never give Roger permission to bring out the story of what Brian had done to him, simply because he was terrified of the possible consequences, but Brian hadn’t expected him to be so fierce about not wanting to make the story public.

‘No!’ John cried as he tore himself away from Roger’s grip around his wrist, ‘no, you can’t sue him!’

Roger, though surprised by his friend’s sudden objection against his plan to take Brian to court, quickly managed to regain his composure. ‘John, he _raped_ you! Of course we’re going to sue him! We can’t let him get away with rape just like this! You deserve justice!’ Roger encouraged as he placed both hands on John’s shoulders, looking intently at him as if to bring some sense back into his friend. But much to Roger’s stress and frustration, not so much for John himself but for his currently failing aim of fighting Brian, John wouldn’t give in.

‘No, you can’t! People can’t know about this, please!’ John gasped, right before he lapsed back into a helpless sobbing, which affected all three of them deeply. It was heart-breaking to hear the boy cry, especially now that it wasn’t just for the forbidden events themselves, but also for his fear of society’s reaction to the crimes that he was not in any perspective responsible for. It made Brian realise that they really needed to stay here, that they needed to talk the forbidden events over as much as possible, especially for John’s sake, even more now that they knew that others absolutely couldn’t find out about the rape in John’s opinion.

‘Roger, please,’ Brian started, ‘I know that there’s no way to play down the things I’ve done, and I’m not even going to try to do so, but we need to figure this out for-’

‘I don’t need to do anything you tell me, you asshole,’ Roger snapped, and it hardly touched Brian that his student was insulting him like this; he couldn’t even care about it, because right now, all he wanted was for Roger and John to stay here so they could discuss the forbidden topic. Wanting to get the idea of turning him in out of his head wasn’t even Brian’s main reason to want to talk to them – he simply couldn’t stand seeing both his victim as his boyfriend cry any longer over the things he’d done to them without him having at them down and talk it over with them, to give them a chance to tell him how they felt – _awful_ , probably – and apologise a million times to them.

‘Come on, John, we’re leaving. We’ll figure this out later,’ Roger’s suddenly soothing voice brought Brian back to reality as he escorted John towards the door again, but soon, his tone turned incredibly dark again. ‘We’ll figure this out when we’re on our own again, without these two _morons_ around us,’ he promised, more to ease his own anger than to comfort John, which seemed to be a mission impossible at the moment.

This time, though, Brian stepped in before Roger could lay his hand on the doorknob by simply stepping in front of him and blocking his way. John winced at just the sight of him; Brian figured that the ongoing bleeding nose Roger had caused him in combination with the vivid images of their ‘private meetings’ was enough to make John fear deeply for him. Roger, on the other hand, seemed to have lost the very last hints of fear he used to possess before he had found out about the rape of one of his best friends and the secret relationship between his other friend and their teacher.

‘Get out of my way, _right_ now,’ Roger threatened coldly, his glare burning right through Brian’s pale face. Still, Brian was determined not to let him walk out of the room for the world.  Even if he was going to get hit for it again, even if he was going to be scolded at or kicked at or whatever more, they _needed_ to settle this for the sake of Freddie, Roger, and most of all for John.

‘No, Roger. Stay with us,’ Brian asked sternly, but Roger wouldn’t listen to him.

‘I’m not warning you again. Get out of my way or I won’t hesitate to fucking _break_ your nose for real,’ Roger replied dangerously, and though Brian didn’t doubt he would actually both mentally and physically be capable of doing so, he simply shook his head at him. He could not give in to him now, because with that, he would be dismissing the one reason he was here; owning up his mistakes and apologising to his three victims.

When it was pretty clear to all of them that Brian wasn’t going to obey to his order anywhere soon, Roger let go of John with a highly frustrated sigh and simply leapt forwards, attacking his teacher by jamming him against the door with one hand, just like Freddie had previously done to him, and tangling one hand viciously tightly into Brian’s untameable curls. When he had knocked the breath out of Brian’s lungs by pressing him against the hard surface of the door all of a sudden, Roger simply pressed him to it with one hand on his hair while giving his face a resounding slap with his now free hand. It was strange, really, to have this angelic-looking blond haired teenager clawing at his hair and sock him on the jaw with a strength powerful enough to make Brian wonder if all his teeth were still located at the place they had been before the blow.

‘I told you to fucking let us go!’ Roger shouted as he tore devilishly painfully at Brian’s hair, but with the image of a sobbing Freddie and a simply devastated John standing just a few metres away from them, Brian did not give in to Roger’s attack that easily. In fact, with Roger’s hand tangled in his dark brown curls, it was fairly easy to grip his wrist between his fingers, and he soon managed to get a hold of his rather uncontrollable other hand as well, which only resulted in an even more frustrated and angered Roger.

‘Let go of me! I swear, if you don’t let me go-’ Roger threatened his teacher, his blue eyes wild and aggravated by this unexpected turn-out of their fist-fight, but Bran managed to mentally resist the angry expression upon his face and physically resist the force the student tried to free himself with.  

‘Okay, that’s enough, Roger,’ he managed in a surprisingly authoritarian voice, forcing Roger’s hands down as much as possible – that was, at least enough to keep them out of reach of his bloodstained face. Freeing Roger’s hand from his hair was most painful, given that he didn’t let go at first and ended up tearing out quite a few locks of it, but Brian was determined to release himself from the grip his student was currently having on him. ‘I can understand your frustration and I probably would’ve done the same in your position, but you can’t do this in front of John,’ Brian told him as rationally as he could in between his own ragged breathing. ‘Look what you’re doing to him,’ he added softly with a nod towards John, who was now being held by Freddie, the both of them breathlessly watching the sight in front of them.

‘What I’m doing to him? What _you’re_ doing to him, you mean! You’re the one who raped him and abused him and blackmailed him and-and God knows what more a lunatic like you is capable of!’ Roger yelled, his voice breaking from angriness in the middle of his sentence. It was then that Brian decided to really step up and take his responsibility, one of the many things he owed Freddie, John, and even Roger.

‘Roger, I know you’re angry, but we’re going to talk about this like decent people,’ he ordered, the sound of the word ‘decent’ feeling weird coming from him, given that he had done things that were anything _but_ decent not even twenty-four hour before. Nevertheless, he added a very serious sounding: ‘Sit down again, _now_. We have things to settle.’

By letting go of Roger’s hands and leaving the boy behind in his state of anger and confusion to walk towards their desks, pulling out their chairs and making a generous  gesture towards it, Brian directed Freddie ad John back to their places. Roger looked sceptical, though, as expected, simply glaring at him and staying exactly where he was. ‘Roger, we have things to settle. Please, if _you_ don’t think it’s important to talk this over and let me explain, then at least stay here for John. You know he needs you,’ Brian added quietly, and the mentioning of the name of his best friend and crush, was what eventually convinced Roger, sighing exorbitantly loudly and reluctantly walking back to his desk to join John, throwing a protective arm around his still softly crying friend’s shoulder.

‘Do you want to stay here?’ he asked John, and when the younger boy nodded feverishly, Roger sighed in defeat. ‘Alright. One wrong word and we’re out,’ Roger threatened curtly, after which he diverted his attention to John again. The messy locks of hair he had extracted from Brian’s mass of curls were carelessly dropped to the floor, and Brian followed the slowly-falling strands with his eyes.

‘Deal,’ Brian agreed in relief as he walked over to his own desk, running one hair through his badly mistreated curls in an attempt to refashion his haircut. Of course, Roger was still furious at him and perfectly ready to jump onto him again, but him sitting down and staying quiet instead of scolding at him and Freddie, certainly was a step into the right direction. ‘Okay, thank you all. Let’s first find you some tissues…’ he announced when he reached over to his bag, producing a small package of tissues from it. John nearly flinched when their hands touched the moment Brian handed a tissue over to him, and Freddie was simply staring at a random point in the distance, not looking up at him or at anyone else around. Therefore, Brian simply extracted a tissue from the plastic package and unfolded it, before carefully starting to dab at the mascara stains that ran down his cheeks.

‘It’s alright. It’s going to be okay,’ Brian promised in a whisper, and though Freddie did look up at him now, he didn’t seem to have a lot of confidence in Brian’s words. Roger followed his example of helping John out with the tissue, carefully, sweetly wiping the lines of tears away with the tissue with his right hand, the fingers of his other hand resting softly on John’s jawline while whispering something to him. Brian couldn’t quite make out what it was, but regarding John’s cautious nod to it, he supposed it was something comforting, like Roger would always do when his friend needed it. No matter how angry he was, for John’s sake he would always try his best to stay calm.

‘Alright then, where do I start?’ Brian sighed as he carelessly tossed the smudged handkerchief into the litter bin behind his desk, not even looking up to see if it would actually reach its destination, because he was too busy focussing on his three students to care about litter falling on the floor instead of in the bin. He moved his chair closer to them, close enough to be able to rest his trembling hands on one of the desks that separated them, but not close enough for Roger to be able to pull him over the desk by his tie and start a third round of attack; he wanted to be able to calmly tell them all he had to tell, for the sake of Freddie, Roger, and most of all John. Fumbling for where to start off telling an unbelievable story like this, he left off with some words to help his boyfriend first. ‘Let me first tell you this. You have absolutely every right to be furious at me, but not to be so at Freddie. He honestly didn’t know about what I was doing and when he found out yesterday, he was absolutely enraged, of course. He’s the reason I’m confessing all this to you. Under threat, would you believe he’s actually capable of doing so?’ Brian said, emitting as much of a chuckle as his body allowed, which wasn’t much in the current situation.

‘Given that he hasn’t abandoned you like he should, I don’t,’ Roger mumbled contemptuously.

‘It’s true, though, dear,’ Freddie spoke, looking at his friend for the first time since a rather long while. ‘I told him that he had to  confess these horrible crimes to you two before we would return home today, and if not, I would’ve reported him to the police tonight. And don’t doubt that I would – I had already looked up the number of the local police station,’ Freddie informed him when Roger looked sceptical, pulling down the left sleeve of his school uniform shirt to reveal an eight-digit number written upon the skin on the inside of his lower arm. Brian shivered at the sight of it, but it seemed to leave an impression on Roger, which was much more important right now. It seemed to impress John as well, but in his case, this was more in a negative way than in a positive.

‘But you… You wouldn’t really have done that, right? Tell them about Roger…a-and me…’ John squeaked, but when Freddie nodded firmly in reply, Brian’s youngest student nearly teared up again, clutching a hand over his mouth while his eyes filled with teardrops again.

‘Deaky, what’s wrong? He _deserves_ to be turned in, at the _very_ _least_ ,’ Roger reminded him, but John shook his head feverishly.

‘No, please, don’t- don’t bring out this story! They can’t know, they will… Please, don’t tell them!’ John managed incoherently, and Freddie put a soothing hand on his friend’s knee.

‘Who are ‘they’, darling?’ he asked softly. ‘The police? The headmaster? The class?’

‘My family! Please, if- if they hear about this… They’ll be so angry at me for letting this h-happen!’ John choked out, and Brian looked at him in compassion, the second tissue he held out for him being snatched away by Roger, who turned his chair towards John and instantly started cleaning his face of newly-added tears. He had always known that John seemed to be afraid of letting his family down, but as he saw the pure terror in John’s eyes now that they’d actually come to the discussion of whether or not to reveal the story to the police, Brian realised that he seemed to be _terrified_ of his family’s reaction, and he couldn’t understand why. If there was _anyone_ to be angry at, it was naturally him as his rapist, and not John, who had never done anything wrong. How could he be afraid they’d be mad at him for these events?

‘How could they possibly be mad at _you_? This isn’t your fault!’ Roger half-asked, half-stated in a kind of disbelief they all felt the moment John revealed that he was afraid of his family’s reaction, the fingers that lingered on John’s cheek brushing along his skin just a little too softly and a little too slowly to be purely amicable.

‘Indeed, John,’ Brian agreed as he leant forwards to his youngest pupil, who instinctively backed away from him. ‘Whatever you think about this, you may _never_ think that it’s your fault in any way. It was one hundred percent my fault, and you’ve never done anything wrong. Can you promise me that?’ Brian asked him seriously, but in John’s hesitant nodding, he could see that he wasn’t positive about his innocence – that was, his _family_ wouldn’t be positive about it, it soon turned out.

‘John, darling,’ Freddie spoke softly when he noticed John’s insecurity and restraint as well, ‘we’re serious about this. You do know that one of this was your fault, don’t you?’

‘But they’ll… they’ll say I should’ve told someone the moment Mister May approached me, and… that I should’ve done something to protect myself. That I was stupid to a-agree to his… offer in the first place, and… Please, they’ll be so angry and disappointed in me!’ John sobbed incoherently, and Roger wasted no time in pulling his friend closer to his body and embracing him tightly yet tenderly, completely leaning into the touch of John’s body and, despite everything, seeming to enjoy the feeling of being this close to his crush and offer him comfort now that he needed it most.

‘Damnit, how could they possibly be mad at _you_?’ Roger asked the younger boy in disbelief. ‘That’d be completely irrational!’

‘That’s just how they a-are, Rog. They won’t… they won’t understand that I let this happen. That I didn’t step up for myself, but I… I wanted to save my grades, because they… They’d be even more disappointed in me if I wouldn’t get into university next year,’ John confessed as hot tears continued to stream down his face, and Brian felt his heart break at John’s story. Of course, he had known all along that John had given in to his solution to the ‘problem’ his teacher had created because he didn’t want to disappoint his family with bad grades. But he hadn’t thought that his family would be focussed on his academic career even more than the student was himself, not to even talk about what John assumed they would probably think about him if it turned out that he had given his teacher permission to sexually abuse him, and with that, probably affect the pride and reputation of both John and his family when the story would spread.

‘John, I’m so, _so_ sorry… I… I just don’t know what to say besides that it- it isn’t your fault,’ Brian stammered, having to avert his eyes from the miserable looking boy.

‘Sure you are,’ Roger didn’t care to oppress making this bitchy remark at him, before focussing on his friend again. ‘But he’s right about the fact that it is not at all your fault, never, ever, _ever_. We can just leave your part out, Deaky. We simply won’t mention your case to the police,’ Roger proposed hopefully, but Freddie talked that idea straight out of his head.

‘I’m afraid that won’t work. They’ll find out about the whole story sooner or later once we turn Brian – it’s Brian for me, by the way – in. You know how things go when the police is working on a case of sexual assault of minors; they’ll interrogate anyone and anything possibly involved, and we can hardly make up a believable story if we leave out every part that includes John, so we won’t even stand a chance in completely dismissing his case,’ Freddie pondered out loud. ‘And on top of that, you only seem to care about justice for John, even though you should realise that what Brian did to you, was sexual assault as well. How do you want to report Brian to the police to avenge the rape of John without mentioning his part of the story?’

Roger started to blush at that, knowing that he hadn’t even uttered a word about himself in his urge to avenge the rape of his secret crush. ‘Because his case is so much worse than mine. There must be something I can do! I can’t let him get away with rape, for God’s sake!’ he shouted, holding tighter onto John when the boy winced at his sudden but not unexpected harshness.

‘I know, but there are plenty of thing we can do without the police,’ Freddie answered calmly.

‘Such as?’ Roger asked sceptically.

‘Oh, don’t worry about that, dear. I’ve already told him that I, as the boyfriend he betrayed and as the friend of two rape victims, won’t let this slip past that easily,’ Freddie said darkly, and Brian blushed, staring down at his hands that were folded in his lap. ‘But we’ll discuss that later. The thing right now, with the police, is that it’s either all or nothing. There is no in between; we have to tell everything or nothing at all, and it’s up to you to decide if bringing out the story is worth it,’ Freddie said, and the nod towards John wasn’t even necessary; they all knew that he wasn’t talking about bringing Brian or the school into disrepute, but about whether it was worth pulling John through the interrogations, the lawsuits, the troubles with his family, and possibly being sent to another school, which indeed seemed to be John’s main source of worry as well.

‘ _Please_ , Roger,’ John begged once more. ‘If this becomes public, my mother will… please, she will… She’ll pull me out of this school, and I don’t… I don’t want to lose you!’ John managed between teary interruptions, his face hidden behind his hands, completely caught up in helpless sobs, looking so, _so_ very fragile. Looking at this innocent fifteen-year old crying his heart out about the possible scenario of being pulled out of school if his family would find out about the destructive rape circuit he had been lured into, made Brian feel guiltier than he had ever done before. There was nothing that John, nor Roger, nor Freddie had ever done to deserve to go through a nerve-wracking, soul-rending time like this. The thing that made Brian feel even worse was that though it was awful to hear John being this afraid of his family’s reaction, deep down inside, besides the guilt and shame and anger towards himself, it secretly relieved him enormously to know that Roger could impossibly bring out this story as long as it would basically ruin the last traces of John’s self-assurance, his family’s respect, and most of all, their friendship that once again turned out to be so much more than just that when Roger threw his arms around John’s torso and pulled him closer.

‘It’s okay. Of course I would never tell anyone if you don’t want me to,’ Roger hushed, ‘because I can’t sta-stand losing you either,’ he admitted painfully emotionally, closing his eyes as he let John’s tears roll onto his shoulder, repeatedly stroking his back while John thanked him softly before breaking down again. ‘There’s no need to thank me, Deaky. I’m sorry if I scared you. I didn’t mean to – I just can’t stand the thought of somebody _hurting_ you,’ Roger said, voice cracking slightly, before closing his eyes and letting the tears stream freely down his cheeks, finally allowing the others to see his grief instead of his usual anger.

It was not the relief that flowed through Brian’s veins the moment Roger promised not to turn him in as long as John didn’t want to, but the sheer sight of the two friends – _crushes_ , that was – holding onto each other even tighter in this disastrous scenario than they normally did, was what made Brian tear up for real.

 _This is the pure reason why all this blackmail and sexual abuse started. We wanted them to be together, and I messed up so, so badly,_ Brian thought with shame and guilt when he observed the image of Roger’s hands smoothly moving over John’s back, his cheek nuzzling at John’s short, brown hair, his whole body language and attitude having changed around completely for the sake of the boy of whom Brian was now a hundred percent sure Roger loved with all his heart.

When Brian’s tears were starting to catch Roger’s attention, causing the blond boy to look up at him with one cocked eyebrow, Brian quickly shook his head. ‘Sorry,’ he apologised as he wiped a line of tears away. ‘It’s just… you two…’ he started with a vague gesture of his hand, but luckily, Freddie seemed to know exactly what he was thinking.

‘Believe it or not, but this image of you two together was what we were striving for. This was the initial plan, before… it all went wrong,’ Freddie said, his voice trailing down slightly.

‘I don’t think I understand,’ Roger said in confusion and lingering anger as he carefully broke away from John, his hand lingering around his friend’s heaving back, drawing soft circles along the curve of whose spine as if to let him know that he was still completely there for him. ‘What plan?’

‘Us wanting to set you two up as a couple,’ Freddie replied, a breathy sob escaping him when Roger simply stared at him. ‘You don’t have to look so dazed, dear. The whole world except for you blind lovebirds can see how perfect you would be together.’

John looked up at Roger when Freddie announced the secret feeling that apparently everybody in the world seemed to share, and the two of them shared a short, kind of nervous look before Roger continued his interrogation. ‘What does…What does Mister May have to do with us?’ Roger asked, clearly not ready to dive into the details of their feelings for each other – but at the same time, also not arguing Freddie’s statement that they would make a perfect pair. ‘Why on earth did he rape John and shag me while dating you?’ Roger asked.

‘Well, Brian-dear, I think you’ve got some explaining to do again,’ Freddie clicked his tongue, and Brian nodded softly, finally daring to move his chair a little closer to his students.

‘I surely have, though I don’t think there could possibly be any explanation that would really bring sense into this situation. Because in all honesty… I’ve simply been the biggest sadist, criminal and complete _idiot_ to have ever walked the earth by doing what I did,’ Brian admitted with a sign, after which he insecurely started telling the same story he had shared with Freddie the day before, with a little addition to the start of the story: the beginning of his and Freddie’s relationship about eight months ago, when Brian had finally had the courage to make him stay after school with a pretext about wanting to have a talk about his slipping grades in maths class, while actually, all he was after was to finally have a ‘real’ talk to him after months of reciprocal stares and awkward smiles towards each other. They turned out to have a lot in common, and when Freddie left the classroom after twenty minutes of talking about mainly music and drawing, Brian had been absolutely sure of it: he was starting to develop a crush on someone he was not allowed to ever fall in love with, let alone begin a relationship with.

After that realisation, things seemed to go even faster than before; Freddie soon lingered behind for a chat after practically every maths class, and Brian found himself  growing head over heels for his favourite student, and he could tell by Freddie’s body language that he seemed to like him back just as much. He knew that they were treading onto a strictly forbidden area, but he convinced himself that there was nothing wrong as long as they didn’t cross the thin line between being crushes and being together.

Then one day, the unexpected but inescapable happened: Freddie, being the shy but bold and daring person he was, had asked the maths teacher out through a note that he’d left in his teacher’s locker. Though Brian had to destroy the evidence as soon as possible, he immediately knew that he the words Freddie had written for him would linger in his mind eternally, they would be engraved in his soul for evermore:

_Please meet me in the pub in the St. Johnsstreet at eight tonight. I’d love to see some more of you xxx Farrokh_

The very moment he read the message, Brian knew that things were wrong, wrong, _very_ wrong, and that giving in to this horribly tempting proposal of his secret crush could have disastrous consequences if somebody was to see them together in a café. But God, how alluring the idea of meeting Freddie somewhere else than in the usual school setting would be, how great it would be to have a few hours just for the two of them… After hours of staring at himself in the mirror in his bedroom, changing shirts at least ten times and making sure his untameable curls looked as decent as possible while pondering about what to do, he eventually decided that he could at least drop by to see if Freddie had had the courage to actually show up.

This particular pub was a place he never visited, and it seemed like a lot of people seemed to do the same; the moment he walked in, the many empty chairs and tables caught his attention rather than the sole bartender standing at the bar who greeted him enthusiastically, probably more than happy to finally have a new customer. Apart from a group of older men sitting around a long rectangular table in the middle of the café and a young couple that was obviously on their first awkward date, regarding their endless giggles and looks being cast away from each other, the room seemed to be empty. Brian chewed on his bottom lip and ignored the hopeful stare of the bartender as his eyes travelled through the pub; he couldn’t spot Freddie anywhere. _Couldn’t he made it? Had he changed his mind? Had it been a joke all along?_

But then, just as the feeling of disappointment and rejection was starting to sink in, when he was about to simply turn around and walk out of the peculiar bar again, Brian noticed a dark-haired person sitting behind the group of men, and though he had his back turned towards him, he simply knew that it could only be one person, the boy who secretly made his heart flutter, the person he had been wanting to see outside of the restrictive school environment for a long, long time. He felt nearly dizzy with nervousness as he nodded kindly at the bartender and shakily walked over to his company for the night.

Freddie didn’t seem to hear him coming at first; only when Brian walked past the table and pulled out a chair across from him, Freddie looked up. One look from him was enough to make Brian’s heart flutter, one blink of those big, brown eyes was enough to make him melt inside, one shy but heart-warming smile of his company made him realise that he was worth taking the risks that dating a minor student brought along. The night together only proved this assumption; sitting in the corner of the room and quietly talking to each other, completely forgetting about the world around them, and with that, the tension of being discovered by someone who wasn’t supposed to find out fading as well, was the best thing Brian could have wished for. At first, he had been afraid that it might have been awkward to be on his own with his not-so-secret crush anymore in an environment like this, but they started the conversation right where they had stopped it at school that afternoon and didn’t stop until the clock reminded them of the fact that it was already a quarter to eleven. Normally, this wouldn’t have been a problem, but given that they both had school the next day, it was probably better to knock it off.

Even more in love than before, Brian suggested bringing his date back home, an offer Freddie gladly accepted, under the condition that he wouldn’t actually make it to the front door – his parents couldn’t find out, of course. Walking through the darkened October streets at night with Freddie had felt strangely good to Brian, who was hoping the road to Freddie’s house would last forever, simply because he didn’t want to let go of his crush yet. When Freddie suddenly stopped at the end of a street, Brian felt a twinge of disappointment, knowing that the their amazing night together had come to and ineluctable end. This feeling didn’t get the chance to actually take over his mood, though, when Freddie leant in and carefully put one hand on his shoulder and one on his waist, stretching on his tiptoes to press a kiss against his unexpecting teacher’s cheek.

‘I had a really nice time tonight,’ he whispered as he pulled back, and Brian, though still taken aback yet pleasantly surprised that Freddie had the courage to kiss him after their very first date, managed to gather enough confidence to do the same to him. He found that Freddie’s skin was super soft yet fairly cold, which was most likely to be a result of the temperature probably having dropped below five degrees at this point in time.  Not that Brian minded this small side issue, though – he gladly pressed his lips against the boy’s cheek, until he instinctively felt that it was time to pull away.

‘I did, too. Thank you for tonight,’ Brian replied softly, as if he was afraid that after having kissed each other, the biggest danger was somebody hearing them saying they enjoyed each other’s company. ‘Go inside, Freddie. It’s cold out here,’ he said – not because he wanted the younger boy to leave or because he wanted to reduce the risk of someone seeing them together, but because he genuinely didn’t want him to catch a cold or some other temperature-related illness that might cause him to have to stay at home for a while, which meant that they couldn’t see each other.

‘I’ll see you at school tomorrow,’ Freddie answered as he involuntarily distanced himself from his teacher, Brian’s eyes following him as he walked along the path that lead towards the front door of the suburban semidetached house, and was admitted into the residence by a woman who was probably his mother, before he walked off to his own apartment in a state of ecstasy.

Freddie was the first thing on his mind when Brian woke up that morning, and when he finally saw his student at school again after a night that seemed to have lasted decades, Brian could tell that they both were infatuated with each other. It had only been a matter of two dates within one week before Freddie had asked him to be his, and needless to say, Brian hadn’t turned down this proposal. Though the thought of being in a relationship that was forbidden by both moral and juridical laws scared Brian immensely, the sheer feeling of being in love flatted out the fear of being caught, at least enough to not break their relationship because they feared the consequences of being caught. And so they carried on with the secret afterschool meetings, the notes they exchanged through mail boxes and schoolbags, the hurried kisses and embraces when they were sure nobody was looking.

‘Everything was just fine, just happening between the two of us, and then one day…’ Brian said, then sighed softly. ‘One day, Freddie asked me if I had ever noticed how close you two were, and if I thought anything of it,’ Brian said with a glance towards John and Roger, who. ‘So I answered that you two seemed to be really good friends, but Freddie… He was sure you two were secretly in love, and didn’t know so yet. He asked me if I could help him set you two up.’

‘So then you saw your window of opportunity and started raping us?’ Roger sneered at him.

‘No! No, no, that was absolutely never the plan. I didn’t even _think_ about that, it didn’t even cross my mind back then. I didn’t know what Freddie wanted me to do, so I told him that I wanted to help him, but that I didn’t know how to. He said he wanted me to talk you two apart and have a chat with you, just to find out if you two liked each other.’

‘I’m very curious to find out how you managed to change ‘talking with’ into ‘blackmailing and raping,’ Roger dared him.

Brian started to fiddle around with the bloodstained collar of his shirt rather uneasily as he told the boys the same story he had confessed to Freddie the day before, starting with the first lie: telling John he wanted to talk to him about the last test he made to have an excuse to talk to him. John blushed and wouldn’t look up at him, let alone react to any one the three people around him, when Brian told about how terrified John had been by just the idea of having to stay after class and how he had offered to do anything as long as Brian wouldn’t give him a fail mark, even though the teacher hadn’t even mentioned anything about the test yet. By the time Brian quietly admitted that he had taken the opportunity to make the offer to John of trading sex for a higher grade, the tears were streaming down John’s cheeks again, and Freddie could only just prevent Roger from leaping towards their teacher to probably ensure that he would have to go around telling people that he somehow had walked into two _doors_ after today, given that all of them were sure the first stomp against his eye would certainly result in a severe black eye.

‘Watch it, Roger,’ Freddie warned his friend as he immediately pulled him back the moment Roger stood up from his chair, but Roger hit his arm away furiously.

‘I’m not the one who has to fucking watch myself!’ he hissed angrily, then sighed in compassion when John started to plead for him not to hurt anyone, and he went back to holding the younger boy against his chest. His expression grew darker and darker the more Brian told them about the crimes he had committed towards John; Brian could see the muscles throughout his whole body tense when he  told them about the blackmail that consisted of purposely giving John a bad grade and then offer him the opportunity of trading sex for a more decent grade, knowing that John could never say no to this, which immediately also included rape and abuse. Brian’s tears and words of sorrow and regret didn’t seem to dawn on Roger at all; his glare only seemed to intensify when Brian apologised a thousand times to the heartbroken student, and when Brian reached out to put his hand on John’s shaking one, Roger didn’t doubt to hit it away before it could even reach its destination, along with a threat about him breaking that arm the very next time it tried to move close to John again.

Though Brian could understand Roger’s anger and frustration very well, it was hard to tell the story while living in the constant fear of knowing that someone could lash out at you after every word you spoke, and Brian shakily moved on to Roger’s part of the story, which actually seemed to calm the atmosphere down in comparison to how it had been when he had admitted and apologised for the things he had pulled John through. Possibly this was because though Roger’s part was awful, nut it wasn’t as pathetic as John’s was, and on top of that, Roger didn’t seem to be very angry at him for the filthy ‘make-up sessions’ for his provocative behaviour. This could partly be because Roger had never done anything involuntarily; he had always loved the after-class moments with his teacher, and always desperately tried to arrange even more of them by behaving insufferable. But at the moment, the absence of his anger towards his own case could also be explained by the fact that he was putting all his effort and attention into trying to hush John, whose sobbing had only intensified now that he head what had been happening to his friend.

‘I’m so- so sorry this… this happened to you,’ John wept helplessly while Roger continued to rub his back, press his chest close against his, nuzzle comfortingly at John’s cheek.

‘It’s alright, Deaky. Believe it or not, but I did it voluntarily. Whereas you… he _raped_ you, John, and I can’t believe I didn’t know. I feel like the worst friend ever,’ Roger admitted .

‘You can’t blame yourself for not knowing, Roger,’ Freddie softly interrupted his friends’ moment alone.  ‘How where you supposed to know when they were trying everything to hide it from us?’

‘Because he’s my best friend!’ Roger responded as he carefully created some space between John and him, so he could focus on Freddie as well. ‘He means everything to me! I should have looked after him better, I should have protected him, I should have found out and helped him, like a good friend would do-’

Freddie, suddenly seeing a way to bend this conversation into the desired direction, asked him: ‘Good friends? Roger, we know how protective and loving you are towards him, and you solely worrying about what kind of injustice Brian’s done to him only proves this. I think it’s about time you get the cards on the table, because we all know that he’s much more than just a friend to you.’

Roger, though he first stared down at his lap in an attempt to probably dismiss the subject at this point in time, suddenly seemed to be willing to cooperate, as it were. ‘Oh God, who am I kidding?’ Roger sighed. ‘Now that we’re confessing everything to each other, I might as well add this. Yes, I love him,’ he spoke to Freddie, before turning to John, who had pulled away from him the moment he admitted that, looking at him in a state of shock. ‘I’m in love with you, John, and I think it’s about time I tell you that after all these years. I love you more than you can ever imagine, and… and I just hope I’m not pulling you through even more shock, but I just… I don’t know how you feel about me, but I just want you to know that I love you, and that I’m going to be here for you,’ Roger managed incoherently but remarkably calmly, knowing that this was what John needed most.

John himself stayed remarkably calmly after this confession of love as well, simply staring at his best friend for a moment with teary eyes, as if he had to process the words he had just been told. Blinking in confusion, he opened his mouth after a handful of seconds, only to close it right after and simply retreat to looking at the boy who had just confirmed his crush on him.

‘John?’ Roger called his name quietly when an answer held off, John’s silence obviously making him a little nervous – and who wouldn’t be? Who wouldn’t be nearly hysterical when you’ve just admitted your feeling to someone who didn’t manage to utter a word for no pre-mentioned reason?

Brian felt his heart starting to pound in his chest more intensely with every passing second of utter quietness, and by the time John cleared his throat in order to probably speak, he was nearly breaking out in cold sweat, given that he – and judging by their expressions, the other two boys as well – couldn’t make up what he was going to say now at all. When new tears started to flow down John’s cheeks again, Brian shortly feared that this confession was only pulling John through more shock and misery than he had already been through today, but this anxiety didn’t ever get the chance to actually settle in his braid when John finally spoke.

‘I n-never… I never thought you would ever love me the way I love you,’ John eventually responded in a choked whisper, and Freddie gave Brian a satisfied, ‘I-told-you’-wink as Roger smiled softly at John, then leaning in to take him back into his arms again and allowing John to let the tears flow for what they hoped would be the last time of the day.

‘Well, well, well, look at that! That’s what we were looking for all the while!’ Freddie laughed genuinely happily as he stood up from his chair to stand behind his two friends, placing a hand on their shoulders. He shared another joyful glance with Brian, who seemed to be so relieved that he was afraid he might tear up as well. They simply watched the two crushes as they clung onto each other again, Roger telling John all over again that he loved him, John’s sobs interspersed with smiles of a kind of happiness he probably hadn’t felt in a too long time, considering the recent events.

‘John, really, hadn’t you noticed? I must have been dropping hints for at least six months!’ Roger said with a small smile when John had pulled himself together again, but John shook his head firmly.

‘No, not at all! I thought you were into girls, and that you were just… protective as a friend, you see?’ he said. ‘Did you know that I… that I loved you as well?’ John asked him in return.

‘Never could have thought… I didn’t even know if you were into love in general!’ Roger admitted, and the both of them laughed about these assumptions that seemed utterly stupid now that they knew so much better.

‘God, you two have been so blind for each other! The whole world except for you could tell that you two should be together,’ Freddie said with as he gave both boys a stroke over their hair, before joining his teacher at the opposite side of the front row of desks, and John blushed as he looked at Roger as if to find comfort in him.

‘I guess we just had other things on our minds to worry about,’ Roger said with a glance at their teacher, but he didn’t even seem to notice when Brian started to apologise a thousand times over for everything he had done; he was already completely absorbed in the person he could hopefully soon call his boyfriend. ‘But now, all we have to worry about is each other,’ he said as he looked at John, who confirmed this statement with a nod, carefully resting his head against Roger’s shoulder. Just the sight of it was enough to make Brian believe that no matter how awful the things they had been going through were, those two belonged together, and they could handle it as long as they had each other – as friends, but even more so as the couple they would hopefully become.

‘John, Roger, I’m just… What can I say? I’m so happy to know that you two love each other the way we hoped, and… I just want to thank you for listening to me today,’ Brian spoke as he finally refashioned his bloodstained tie. ‘You have every reason to be furious at me and to hate me and whatever more, but just… as long as you never blame yourself for what happened. Never be bad at yourself for what happened. Especially you, John,’ he spoke carefully.

‘I… I’ll try my best,’ John said softly. ‘Just as long as you promise to not bring out the story. _Please_ ,’ he added the last word desperately, but he was reassured when the three men around him pledged one by one that they were going to leave it at this if that was what he wanted – and even Roger seemed to be satisfied when Freddie swore that he would not let his boyfriend get away with his crimes this easily. What he was planning to do with him, was something he didn’t want to disclose yet – Brian only just had this foreboding that it was probably best to keep the handkerchiefs close at hand and not change his bloodstained shirt until the end of the day.

After this promise, a few more apologies and other words of sorrow and regret, Brian could almost feel the session coming to an end; both Roger and John even more  looked like they needed some time to simply rest and think over what they had been told today, so Brian decided to fathom if he could close the discussion for today. ‘Is there anything more you want to say, or want me to do for you…’ Brian asked the two boys, and as he saw John fighting hard – and ultimately failing – to oppress a yawn, he instantly saw his window of opportunity to add: ‘Or would you rather go home now? I think it’s been a long day for all of you, and you’ll probably want to go home and be as far away from me as possible.’

John looked down insecurely at that last remark, but he did have the courage to speak his mind this time: ‘I would like to go home, Mister May, if you don’t mind.’ And certainly Brian didn’t mind; after all John had been pulled through today – his rape becoming public to his best friends, finding out about Roger’s questionable affair slash sexual molestation by the same person who had been abusing him, all this while Freddie had been  in a seemingly perfectly sane, voluntary, and consensual relationship that yet still was illegal to the law. The only good yet confession was Roger admitting his crush on him, but after all that had happened, this first seemed to have been more of a shock to John than a source of delight. Right now, the feeling of happiness seemed to start sinking in, but Brian could tell that his youngest student was simply exhausted after having gone through all this soul-rending after-class time.

‘That’s probably the best idea,’ Freddie concluded after a glance at the tired looking boy that was sitting across from him. ‘We’ll discuss all that needs to be discussed later.’

‘Of course,’ Brian agreed, and him standing up from his chair was a sign for the rest of them to do so, too. ‘I suggest you two take a day off tomorrow; I’ll tell the headmaster that you couldn’t make it due to some… issues of personal nature,’ he suggested, and John nodded thankfully as he picked up the schoolbag Roger handed him. ‘Shall I bring you home? I’ve got a car, I can just drive you over…’ Brian proposed, but he dropped his offer when he saw Roger shaking his head, softly but resolutely.

‘No, it’s alright. I’ll take him home,’ he said with a glance towards John that contained such and amount of affectionate protectiveness that Brian couldn’t do anything but nod at him. It was probably best for them to be together alone right now, without Freddie or him interfering, not to even mention that John being dropped off by his teacher long after he should have been home, would probably draw a lot of unwanted attention from his apparently overly strict family, and that was just about the last thing the boy needed right now.

‘Do you live any close to each other?’ Brian questioned instead, and John and Roger looked shortly at each other before Roger replied.

‘Not really, actually. John lives pretty close to school, but our districts are… about three miles apart, I think. But that’s doesn’t matter, it’s only half past five. I’ll be home before my mum will start worrying,’ Roger chuckled softly.

‘Alright then. Wait, hold on,’ Brian suddenly said as he turned to his bag, fetching his wallet and shaking out a handful of pounds and pences, before reaching out to hand it over to Roger. ‘For the bus trip back. I hope this will do, because I don’t have any more at the moment…’ he said as he held his purse upside down, only the empty white packing of a single aspirin and a crumpled receipt from yesterday’s trip to the supermarket falling out of it.

‘I can’t take your money, Mister May,’ Roger answered a with a detachment that was closer to uneasiness than to anger right now. ‘I can walk back home, it isn’t that far-’

‘Please, you shouldn’t have to walk three miles,’ Brian hastily replied as he pressed the money in the palm of Roger’s hand, but the blond boy didn’t give in yet.

‘Really, Mister May. I can’t take this from you,’ Roger informed him as he tried to hand it over again, but Brian wouldn’t take it back.

‘Of course you can. This is the least I can do for you after… after everything,’ he managed painfully, and even Roger glanced down, nodding carefully as if to finally silently agree.

‘Alright, then I suggest we should go now,’ Freddie said to break  the slightly awkward silence that followed. ‘Tomorrow it’s **Friday** , so I’ll see you two next week,’ Freddie said to his friends. He walked over to pull a still slightly hesitantly Roger into a hug, promising him once again that he would make sure Brian would get his just deserts for his actions, before moving on to the boy standing next to Roger. John blushed heavily when Freddie, being the casual joy bringer he was, leant in to peck his cheek without any signs of discomfort - as could have been expected from the flamboyant schoolboy.

‘Don’t worry, dear, this is going to be both the first and the last time I’m going to kiss you. I just figured I should do it now, before the right of kissing you will exclusively belong to Roger,’ he explained himself with a wink, which fortunately convinced both of them of the sheer innocence behind the cheeky gesture.

After this, Roger placed a hand on the small of John’s back as he guided him towards the door, and after having exchanged a few words of goodbye, they left the classroom, and with that, their best friend and whose partner behind. As soon as they closed the door behind them, Brian gave in to the urge to simply break down, so he sank down on his bureau chair again, put his elbows on the desktop, and rested his forehead on his hands.

‘This was the worst day ever,’ he groaned softly, massaging his painful forehead with his fingertips for what must have been at least the firth time that day.

‘I know, but you did the right thing by telling them, Brian,’ Freddie told him, to which Brian sighed.

‘I hope so, but I just feel so fucking guilty,’ he whispered in the smallest voice.

‘As you should,’ Freddie said sternly, but he did walk over to him and gave his boyfriend’s untameable curls a soft, loving pat. ‘But they deserved to know and they deserved an apology even more so. And as I expected, they’re not turning you in, Roger didn’t violate you the way I feared, and they admitted their crushes on each other. What more could you wish for?’

‘That I never would have allowed myself to stand so close to them in the first place,’ Brian mumbled miserably, more to himself that to his company.

‘So do I, but we can’t go back in time and change the things you did. All we can do is move forward from this point,’ Freddie said as he walked towards the window, and though Brian would have preferred inventing a time machine, he could do nothing but agree to these wise words of his boyfriend, who once again promised him that this had been the right thing to do.

‘Look, Bri! Come over here,’ Freddie gestured before turning to the sight outside again with a smile, and Brian was curious enough to find out what his boyfriend was so happy about – and didn’t want to refuse anything after Freddie had vowed to stay with him even through all the things he’d done to both him of his friends, so he ignored his searing headache as he walked towards his partner, who by now was supporting himself by having placed his hands on the window frame so he could lean against the window itself with his forehead as if to optimise his view.

‘What should I look at?’ Brian asked as he followed Freddie’s example of practically trying to become one with the window, squinting to clear his view as it was blocked by the brightly shining sun, but just when the words left his lips, he understood what his boyfriend meant as he looked down to discover two students making their way down the broad, grey-asphalted pavement that separated the fields of neatly mowed grass at the backside of the school. Even though the two were walking away from the school and therefore could not be recognised by their face, Brian could tell by their brown leather school bags and the half-long blond hair in combination with the short brown hair of the person who walked next to him that it were unmistakably John and Roger. They slowly strolled down the path, walking just as close to each other as they would normally sit next to each other in class, and Brian could have sworn he saw them ‘accidentally’ touching hands more than just once.

‘Look at our little lovebirds, Brian. Aren’t they the best thing ever?’ Freddie said, and Brian hummed in agreement.

‘I’m so happy that we… that we somehow managed to fulfill the initial goal of showing them how much they love each other,’ Brian told him, and he could feel Freddie’s hand slipping around his waist, his lips against a jaw, something Brian knew he didn’t deserve in a hundred thousand years, yet still he enjoyed it very much and reciprocated the act by kissing Freddie’s forehead.

‘I knew I was right when I said they should be together,’ Freddie said with a smile as they looked at Roger, who had stopped John in the middle of the pavement to adjust something about the school uniform blazer he was wearing, but his hands worked too carefully and too slowly on the revers of the dark blue garment to readjust it – he was probably just looking for reasons to be close to John, knowing that he was all his now. Brian was mollified to see this, but at the same time it made him so very sad to remember all the times he had been pulling at John’s clothes for reasons completely different than to refashion the garments or to just innocently find a reason to touch him like Roger was going right now. He wondered if John thought it was okay for Roger to touch him, or to come close to him at all, after having been pulled through the crimes of his teacher.

Deciding to share his feelings about the way they had get John and Roger go just minutes ago, Brian said: ‘But what if John’s going to need professional help one day? I don’t think he yet realises just what I’ve done to him. What if he can’t process everything he went through on his own?’ he started to worry, but Freddie dismissed the idea with a wave of his hand.

‘But he isn’t on his own, Brian-dear,’ Freddie reminded his partner. ‘Roger will be there for him, and believe me, not a single professional psychologist can beat the support Roger can give him by simply loving him the way he does.’

‘I… Maybe you’re right,’ Brian agreed softly. ‘But I’m just so worried about him.’

‘I know, but… To say that there’s no need to worry about him would be stupid, but I think it’s fair to say that he’s in good hands with Roger. Believe me, he might be the most troublesome student around, but he’s such a sweetheart towards his friends, and certainly towards John,’ Freddie said as they watched the two boys disappear around the corner of a street. Seeing that his lover still wasn’t completely reassured – and who could blame him? – Freddie tried to comfort him with a new promise. ‘I’ll drop by to check on John after school tomorrow, alright?’

‘Alright,’ Brian agreed, sounding a little more relieved now. ‘Or would that be too long? Maybe you should go to him tonight, or… at least give him a call or…’

‘I think he needs a bit of time to recover first, dear,’ Freddie disagreed, to which Brian blushed a little. ‘We shouldn’t jump onto him right away. And on top of that… I think he prefers to have just Roger by his side after all this time, don’t you? I think we should leave those lovebirds on their own for a while,’ Freddie winked, and Brian finally allowed himself to smile.

‘Why do you think I gave them a day off? They should be spending time together now that they finally know about their feelings for each other,’ Brian told him.

‘And so should we,’ Freddie answered, ‘I think it’s about time we go home as well, because I’m gonna need more than just one word with you about all this,’ he said as he gave a soft but sudden pull at Brian’s tie to indicate that they were going to leave. With one more look at the now empty green grass fields and adjoining streets behind the school area, Brian and his boyfriend followed the example of the younger boys by leaving the classroom, their hands touching carefully as they made their way down the endless broad winding staircases of the school, knowing they were all on their own anyway. They arrived at the ground floor of the stately building, and after having opened the large front door towards freedom for Freddie first, Brian followed his lover outside. He blinked against the sunlight that always managed to surprise him after having been inside the dark school building all day long by just how bright it was. But when his eyes eventually got used to the light and therefore could focus on the shiny black hair of his boyfriend, the sparkle in his dark eyes, the small smile on his lips as he asked him if he was going to come with him, and mostly, with his conscience a lot less heavy now that he knew no repeat performances of the crimes he had committed were ever going to happen, Brian was sure of just one crucially important thing – from now off, everything was going to be so much better.

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**Epilogue**

‘That’s it for today, folks. Have a nice weekend,’ Brian smiled softly as he opened the door and watched the swarm of ninth-year boys rushing out of the classroom and towards the freedom that Friday afternoon offered. That was, if the fifth period of the day was your last; the school didn’t close until after the eighth period, but luckily for Brian, the next hour – Freddie’s class – was the last period before his weekend would officially start. But with lunch break up first, Brian decided that he could probably best make use of these thirty empty minutes in his schedule by first picking up the mess of broken pencils and paper balls the thirteen year olds had left behind on their desks and on the floor, after which he would start grading their homework. With a sigh, Brian pulled the litter bin out of the corner of the classroom and started the usual routine of cleaning after his classroom, softly humming some random tune he had heard on the radio the night before. As he picked up the first empty bag of crisps – who on earth had managed to eat crisps in his class without him noticing? – he realised that he wasn’t alone in the room any longer. From the corners of his eyes, he noticed the contours of a person standing in the doorway, and he didn’t even have to look up to see who it was; just the casual posture of leaning against the doorpost and the arms crossed over his chest was all it took for Brian to realise that it could be nobody else but his ex-student.

‘Mister May? Mister Vandebilt asks if he can have our test results from the last terms. Do you still have them?’ Roger asked in the most neutral, business-like tone, which was probably the best thing he could possibly pull off after the things his teacher and his two best friends had been through. It was two weeks after, and unless Freddie was with him, Roger was usually rather distant, hostile, and bitchy towards the young maths teacher, which Brian could understand perfectly well and which he certainly didn’t blame the boy for, but he just wished it could be different. Roger also surely didn’t seem very happy that his new maths teacher had sent him to fetch the tests, but how could poor Mister Vandebilt know that his newest student wasn’t exactly excited to meet up with his ex-teacher slash rapist again?

‘Roger, do come in, please!’ Brian offered friendly, and Roger hesitantly, visibly begrudgingly stepped forward into the room he used to have classes in three times a week, among other less legal activities. ‘Of course I still have them. John’s and yours?’  he asked as he strode over to the filing cabinet and pulled open the upper drawer to look for the desired records. Roger just nodded.

‘It’s good to see you again,’ Brian smiled sincerely when he flicked through the neatly ordered document files, but it clearly took all of Roger’s willpower to produce the smallest of a not too sour smile, and Brian quickly changed the subject.

‘Where is he?’ Brian asked, both of them immediately knowing that they were talking about John.

‘He’s waiting for me in the hallway. It was a bit too early for him to come in and see you,’ Roger answered protectively, which was the reply Brian had anticipated. In all honesty, he was happy to know that John and Roger could now decide for themselves if they wanted to see their old maths teacher or not. Knowing it was better for Roger and mainly for John to not have to face him three times a week, Brian had managed to put them in another maths class the week after the confessions. A lame story about his class being overcrowded with its 32 pupils, while the other eleventh grade maths teacher Mister Vandebilt only had twenty-seven in his class, had done the job. Brian had ‘mindlessly’ proposed the idea to the headmaster by saying that it would be better for the sake of the students to have a quieter class, and that he had already found two ‘randomly selected’ pupils who didn’t mind being placed into another class – needless to say that these were John and Roger.

‘I understand,’ Brian nodded, quickly peeking around the corner of the opened door to see if he could spot John, which he did – he caught a glimpse of him, just before the boy took a step back, probably instinctively feeling that he was being stared at. ‘How is he doing, if I may ask?’

‘He’s doing alright. Better than I expected in the first place for sure,’ Roger said hesitantly, before opening up for his ex-teacher a little. ‘He does sometimes have a bit of a mental breakdown when we’re on our own, and then nothing will make him stop crying, which is really hard to see…’ he said, swallowing painfully, and Brian hardly dared to face him. ‘But he’s willing to talk about it with me and he seems to be getting better every day. I think time will heal his wounds… And hopefully yours as well,’ he added a little shamefully, but Brian simply shrugged it off. While the damage of his bleeding nose had vanished over the course of the weekend, Brian’s black eye was even now still clearly visible for the rest of the world, but an even lamer pretext about having walked into a door, the oldest excuse in the book, was all it took to convince people that it had been an accident, or at least, to make them stop asking any further questions.

‘I really hope time will heal him, and I’m happy to hear that he’s opening up about it,’ Brian replied. Though Freddie had met up with John the day after the confessions and continually tried to inform Brian about how he was doing, it wasn’t the same as speaking to the person who was undoubtedly closest to John. Luckily, the two sources of information were not contradicting each other; both said that John seemed to be alright, but just needed lots of time to get over the immoral events.

‘So am I,’ Roger agreed. ‘And I’m glad he wants to talk about his demons with me, out of all people.’

‘Of course he wants to talk about it with you. It’s always you, remember?’ Brian said, to which Roger blushed. ‘You’re his best friend and you’re well on the way to become more than just that.’

The smile that spread on Roger’s face was all Brian needed to see to deduct that they were already past that stage; he didn’t even needed Roger’s words of confirmation, but he still loved to hear them. ‘I think we’ve been officially ‘more than just that’ since last week.’

‘Really? Roger, I’m so glad to hear that!’ Brian smiled, and he was genuinely happy for them, genuinely happy that all of this misery had somehow still led to something positive. ‘How does it feel to have a boyfriend now?’

‘Strangely good, to be honest,’ Roger admitted with a smile, and when he started talking with such subdued excitement, it was as if nothing bad had ever happened for a moment. ‘It’s just… It’s lovely, but he’s so different from all the girls I’ve dated before. John is so much more careful and wants to take things show – and I wouldn’t have expected anything else from him,’ Roger giggled softly, and Brian joined him. Then, in a much more serious tone, Roger continued: ‘He’s still hesitant to any possible form of touching or affection because it easily reminds him of, you know…’ Roger explained with a vague gesture of his hand, and Brian nodded in understanding, knowing they both preferred not to use that particular four-letter one-syllable word to describe the awful events with. Then, to lighten up the atmosphere, Roger spoke wisely: ‘But I really love being together with him, and I’ll give him all the time he needs. And besides that, dating a boy really has its merits, you know. When John stayed over at my house last weekend, my mother didn’t even pull us apart to have us sleep in different rooms at night,’ Roger added with the typically naughty smirk that Brian remembered so well from the many times he had seen it before, in both good and bad situations.

‘She doesn’t know yet?’ he assumed.

‘No, we’ve decided to wait with telling her until John is ready for it. And to be really honest, I’m not ready to give up getting to sleep next to him yet,’ Roger smiled, and Brian followed his example. He was indescribably happy to hear that the two friends – _boyfriends_ , that was – seemed to be doing well despite everything, and that Roger chose to share this with him as well.

‘I’m so happy that you’re being there for him. I couldn’t have wished for someone better to look after John than you,’ he confided, to which Roger blushed and scratched at the back of his head a little uneasily. Brian, feeling that he wanted to go back to John as soon as possible,  quickly resumed his task, found the required papers and handed the two transparent document files over to Roger.

‘Here are your tests, and these are John’s…’ Brian said as he gave him the papers. Upon immediately finding Roger studying the tests of his boyfriend, Brian added: ‘Complete with all the well-deserved A’s. I hope it will boost his confidence a little, because he really is very good at maths and he really deserves these grades. Please tell him that.’

‘I will,’ Roger promised. ‘I think it will help him.’

‘Hopefully it will. Anything else?’ Brian asked him.

‘Yes, actually, there’s this little something…’ Roger said as put the papers on the desk next to him and dug deeply into the pocket of his black trousers to eventually produce something small that Brian couldn’t quite make out, until the moment Roger handed the shiny little pieces over to him. ‘Here, I think you should have these back,’ Roger informed him with a nod towards the bus money Brian had given him the day of the confessions. ‘I never used them – I stayed at John’s house that night, and we walked to school together the next day.’

Brian swallowed painfully as he stared at the small bits that reminded him awfully much of all that had happened , before the positivity of Roger’s words started to dawn on him. _He had been staying with him the night after the confessions, when John probably needed him most. They had probably been sleeping together, in the same room at least, so that Roger could comfort John when he needed him in the middle of the night. And the next day, he probably helped him to get out of bed and face a new day at school, a new beginning after everything that had happened, which was hard but so much better than the previous situation. They must have dressed up in their school uniforms together, had breakfast together, walked to school together, sat suspiciously close to each other and giggle over the silliest things all day long, as usual;  just them being them, doing the things they were best at – loving each other._

‘Here,’ the educator said as he handed the coins back to Roger, ‘I want you to keep it.’

‘No, Mister May, I can’t keep it. It’s yours,’ Roger answered. ‘It would be way too much for a simple bus trip, anyway. I could go to school by bus for the whole week with this amount,’ Roger chuckled, and Brian blushed a little – ever since he had the luxury of owning a car, he had completely lost track on how much the public transport charged for a trip. This once again became painfully clear when he really took a look at the amount of money Roger was holding in hands, which indeed was _excessive_ at the very least, given that it was just for a single bus trip.

‘Still, I want you to keep it. Not for the bus, but for you two. The weather’s nice outside, the sun is shining… Take John out after school to get ice cream, or a drink, or… buy him something. I heard that a new Rolling Stones single was released yesterday. I don’t know if he likes their music, but… Or go to the movies with him tonight. Does he like that?’ Brian found himself summing up rather incoherently, trying everything to make Roger keep the money he had given him.

‘Well, he does enjoy going to the movies…’ Roger pondered out loud, and Brian nodded hastily.

‘Okay, then please do that!’ Brian said, relieved that he had found a joyful destination for the money. ‘How much does a movie ticket cost these days? God, I’ve completely lost my social life ever since I’ve been a teacher…’ Brian sighed, and even Roger couldn’t help but chuckle. ‘I’m not sure if this will be enough… Wait, I should have a five pound bill somewhere in my purse,’ he said as he reached out for his bag, but Roger stopped him.

‘Mister May, a ticket is only one seventy-five at the moment. This will be more than enough, and I actually can’t even take _this_ from you-’ Roger started a little uneasily.

‘You’ll need popcorn and drinks, too, isn’t so?’ Brian asked as he pulled out the bill he had been talking about. ‘Please, Roger, just take it,’ he pleaded when the blond boy looked like he was going to complain again. ‘I want you two to have a nice time together after all you’ve been through.’

‘But we are! We’re certainly having a nice time together, don’t worry about that,’ Roger assured, giggling a little uncomfortably when Brian couldn’t oppress the urge to stuff the five pound bill in the front pocket of his dark blue school uniform blazer.

‘Movie, popcorn, drinks, ice cream, whatever you like… How will you get there? Do you need any bus money?’ Brian pondered out loud, but just as he reached out to grab his purse again, which caused Roger to faintly protest, they were interrupted by the sound of footstep nearing the classroom.

‘Oooh, what is going on here? Illegal drugs trade, my dears?’ Freddie cooed as he paced towards his friend and his partner, quickly pecking the cheek of the latter before flopping down on Brian’s desk. _No one of my classroom population seems to know what the difference between a desk and a chair is,_ Brian deducted dimly after witnessing yet another student seating himself on top of his bureau _._ Not that he minded, though – he actually rather enjoyed the fact that these students felt comfortable enough around him to break the unwritten social rules, certainly regarding the things he had been pulling them through.

‘No, just putting our maths skills into practice by using pi to calculate the diameter of a coin so we can counterfeit it. Look at the perfectly measured perimeter of this piece – you can’t possibly tell it’s fake!’ Roger answered as he held a fifty pence coin between his thumb and index finger in front of his eye, to which both boys giggled. ‘No, actually, I’m trying to be polite by handing back the bus money Mister May gave me, but he doesn’t want me to.’

‘I told him to keep the money for John and him to go out sometime,’ Brian told Freddie his side of the story, to which the dark-haired boy nodded in agreement.

‘Those two can definitely use a nice date together. Are we going out too sometimes, Bri?’ Freddie asked, batting his eyelashes exorbitantly quickly at him, and Brian snickered.

‘Sure we will, but we’ll have to wait until tomorrow. Tonight, the city is all theirs,’ Brian said with a nod towards Roger, who blushed slightly. ‘Please, though, Roger. Take John out or buy something fun for the two of you. You really deserve it,’ Brian told him kindly, but Freddie’s tactic of showing his friend how to spend the money was a little _different_ from Brian’s way, to say at the very least.

‘Go out tonight, drag John into the nearest pub and buy him a drink or two, or three, or four… just how much it takes to get him drunk. Find out how much he can handle before he’ll start getting licentious – a great idea for a first date, guaranteed fun, I promise!’ Freddie chanted as he flashed Roger a thumb-up, but Roger just snorted at the ridiculous plan his best friend proposed.

‘There’s a lot you can say about me, Bulsara, but that’s something you can add to the frighteningly short list of things I would never do. I won’t let John drink, he’s not even sixteen yet!’ Roger’s usually soft, high and almost girly voice contained a hint of disbelief about the fact that Freddie brought up such a disastrous plan, even though he knew that it was nothing but a joke. It was funny, to hear these words coming from somebody they knew could drink like a fish if he got the opportunity; remarkably though, this was not the aspect Freddie chose to tease him about.

‘Ooh, are you starting to get overprotective of your boyfriend already?’ Freddie cooed teasingly, to which Roger started to blush.

‘I’m not _ove_ rprotective, you know. I’m just looking after him,’ the younger boy defended himself.

‘Sure you are,’ Freddie chuckled. ‘Well, the break is almost over, so I suggest you go back to John to _look after him_ before he starts binge drinking the bottles of vodka I know for a fact you’re hiding in your locker,’ he added mercilessly, making Roger sigh and solemnly inform them that he did not keep any alcohol at school, which only made Freddie smile more. ‘Darling, I was just kidding. But I believe John’s starting to miss you, especially given that I believe biology is next up for you two,’ he said, and the three of them grimaced involuntarily at just the thought of the most boring class given by the most tiresome, monotonous, and just overall lifeless teacher the school had ever managed to hire.

‘In that case, I’ll be off to save him, because I won’t let him go to that awful class alone,’ Roger said determinedly as he swung the strap of his school bag over his shoulder, collecting the papers he had initially come for, and leaving his friend and former maths teacher behind with a distinctively cheerful greeting.

‘So protective… I knew he’d be a great, responsible boyfriend to John,’ Freddie whispered dreamily when he was sure Roger couldn’t hear him anymore, but Roger wasn’t the only one who didn’t listen to him – Brian was also focussing on other people than his boyfriend at that moment. The teacher watched his ex-student as he walked out of his classroom, his pace quickening when he neared John, who smiled softly when Roger approached him. Throwing an arm around his waist, Roger handed John the papers their former maths teacher had given him, and John frowned lightly as he started studying the tests. They stood right in the middle of the hallway, but John was too absorbed in the tests to notice, and Roger, in his turn, was too fond of looking at John in his state of concentration to care. Through the stream of students that entered his classroom, Brian could see Roger pressing a quick kiss against John’s jaw before the boy could even notice that he had been leaning towards him, and John looked up to smile at him before he went back to studying the papers that carried the honest evidence of his skills in maths. As if he felt he was being stared at, Roger turned around to flash his teacher a wink, and Brian, though surprised by this sudden gesture, quickly gave him a thumb-up.

‘John and Roger, Mister May?’ Freddie asked him coyly as he sat down at his desk, which was still the far right one of the table he used to share with the aforementioned people, as if he had no idea what had just been happening, pretending to just have gotten into the classroom along with the other two and a half dozen of students Brian was going to have to lecture for the upcoming fifty minutes, and Brian nodded in response as his eyes followed the departing couple.

‘Yes, Farrokh,’ he said with a contented sigh, automatically falling back into the more formal way of addressing his boyfriend now that they were surrounded by other people again. ‘You were right,’ Brian added softly as he turned around to pick up his piece of chalk, speaking the words more to comfort himself than anybody else. Freddie probably couldn’t hear him now that he was flicking through the doodle-covered pages of his notebook, and that was fine – Brian didn’t mind not having any audience but himself to speak these words of happiness and relief to. ‘They’ll be alright. They’re meant for each other.’


End file.
